Gogo Makhotha’s home can be described as a warm vibrant space for joy and connection. A haven of creativity that makes every corner to whisper “Free yourself, you are at Gogo Makhotha’s home”
Assisted by Nomzamo’s drone that was hovering above as the children started to arrive at their favourite spot on the 26th December 2024. It captured every gesture which suggested that the wait was worth every day and the present moment blended by the sunny day was perfect for the event.
“Today we are here to celebrate the 3rd anniversary of this event and to officially launch the Elevate Club, your club is here at Edenvale village” stated the Chairperson of the Club, Phumla Nkonde. She was talking to the community youngsters and their parents who gathered in the tent for the event. On behalf of the club executives, Phumele Jele, serving as a Secretary and Nombulelo Zulu, a Treasurer, she invited everyone to support the club.
(Phumla- left and Phumele- Right)
The day was filled with three main activities: team building activities, creative coding for the
little ones and coding tournament using the Juicy Gems App created by Dutoit Agri in collaboration with Tangible Africa.
When the event finally started, everyone was ready to make his or her team proud in all the team building activities planned for the day. It was confirmed by the their team names that they were ready to compete. Every child was afforded an opportunity to express his or her level of creativity including the little ones, who never minded the rules of the activities but were determined to finished the tasks given.
I once again observed their delight, curiosity as they handle the tablets. You can tell from their tiny fingers all over the screens as they waited for instructions, indicating that this was their first time using tablets. Mostly completed the game with average to high scores of between 46 to 120. It was challenging to pick the correct answers from the Juicy Gems App question sections because the Dutoit Agri was about fruits farming and they were from livestock farming background. It was going to be easy to answer questions about Gogo Makhotha’s cattles or the late Magwazas’ sheeps. Magwaza was name given to the first farmer in this village and the farm is now owned by his son called Maniki.
The Mpumalanga ICT Club was instrumental in ensuring that this village establish it's own coding club and we acknowledged the support: firstly from Vuma Primary School in eMalahleni for the tablets, Nomzamo Makhotha for capturing the event with her drone and managed to address the curiosity of these youngsters about drone technology and Nomusa Keninda for mentoring and coaching the Elevate Club executive members who are also Tangible Africa's interns and coding ambassadors. Lastly, we salute Gogo Makhotha for making her home, a source of growth, hope and inspiration to elevate the community of Maserijini village.
