NEWS
2 November 2020
Organic home gardens
As the Covid 19 pandemic progress many community members are worried about food security. Rising of food prices and loss of income are hitting hard the vulnerable people. Higher retail prices will result in more households having to cut down on their food quantity. With potential lasting impact on nutrition and health especially for children and people who are on chronic medication. Woza Moya is implementing 100 door size deep trench organic home gardens across Ufafa valley. Alan Hofland (horticulturalist) trained local women on how to set up a nursery and bookkeeping. These women are expected to look after for their nursery and sell seedilings to community members. Food garden champions were also trained on permaculture gardens. The selected households will implement permaculture door size gardens in their homesteads and they will be mentored by food garden champions. “If community members learn how to grow their own food, they will help themselves” says Thuli Mtolo who oversees the Sustainable livehoods programme. Thank you to KZN Slots and MAMAS Alliance for partnering with in improving food security.
22 April 2020
ETV LIVE INTERVIEW
With Covid-19 and the effects of Lockdown hitting the rural communities in South Africa very hard, Sue Hedden explains the issues and why support is so badly needed in these strange times. Click on the image above to view the interview from etv from Tuesday evening.
19 April 2020
MAMAS TO THE RESCUE!
Woza Moya and the surrounding Ufafa Valley Community have been hit hard by Covid-19 and the subsequent Lockdown. Children’s Fund Mamas (CFM) have stepped in to help with a generous donation of emergency relief funding which has allowed Woza Moya to purchase food parcels for 200 homes in the Ufafa Community. CFM will be supporting Woza Moya with Food Parcel funding until June. Many thanks to the Mamas team for their support in these difficult times.
19 April 2020
GENEROUS FARMERS MAKE A HUGE IMPACT!
Farmers around Ixopo are rallying together and providing food parcels for vulnerable households. Many thanks to all involved for this generous act of kindness during Lockdown. Siyabonga Balimi!
03 March 2020
South Coast Outing
On a perfect warm sunny day in February, the Woza Moya team of 34 adults, and 35 Children aged 3-5, headed for the beautiful South Coast of KwaZulu-Natal, for a much anticipated outing. The children saw the Indian Ocean for the first time. All hands were on deck to ensure their safety, as they swam in crystal clear warm waters, built sand castles, scrambled up and down sand dunes, kicking balls and having the time of their life. Sometimes it wasn’t clear who were the adults and children! This amazing day provided much needed therapy for all of our team, who work at the coalface of life and death issues, every day in the Ufafa Valley Community.
03 March 2020
Girl power with powergirl!
In February a fantastic new programme for 48 local girls, aged 9-15 powergirls.com was launched at Woza Moya. Developed by MAMAS, this innovative 7 year programme, aims to transform vulnerable girls to become outspoken and powerful young women, capable of becoming change agents within their communities. Woza Moya is situated in a traditional Zulu area where patriarchy, assumed male supremacy and gender-based violence are common. Many young girls are denied the opportunity of ever reaching their full potential. PowerGirls intends to change this by providing young and adolescent girls with the tools to become resilient, positive and inspirational role models for those coming after them. Woza Moya PowerMama Coordinator, Sinethemba Ndlovu, has great expectations: 'My two PowerMama facilitators, Thembi, Zandile and I are excited. We are going to give our girls hope and a bright future with this programme.'
31 October 2019
Hella Hella Workshops
Woza Moya Child & Youth Care Workers, Sine Ndlovu & Thembi Chiliza, were invited to lead workshops for 60 young school girls, at the nearby Hella Hella camp GLOW, arranged by Peace Corps Volunteers (PCV). Focussing on self-esteem and healthy relationships, Sine and Thembi used interactive fun methods to convey their messages. Feedback from Ciara Clark, PCV, was that Sine and Thembi were loved by the girls, who voted their workshops as being their favourite!
31 October 2019
Friend Raising update
Thank you to Belly Fusion for a wonderful evening in support of Woza Moya. Thank you also to Donna & Jacinta who hosted a tea party at their Pennington home. Please invite us to share our story! No demands, expectations or donations requested! KZN anytime and Gauteng end of NOV and/or early DEC. Please contact Sue at sue@wozamoya.org.za
31 October 2019
Special Visit from Alice
In October Woza Moya was gifted with a special volunteer, Alice Loo, Kindergarten teacher from Belgium. Alice worked side by side with the Woza Moya ECD Practitioners enriching them and the children with new ideas and insights. The monthly ECD Forum was co-hosted by Woza Moya ECD Consultant, Lynn Stefano and Alice Loo, focussing on Nutrition. Practitioners have learnt about good nutrition in their NQF 4 training and through C- IMCI trainings with Department of Health. They revised key information, by making plates of healthy snacks and creating a poster using drawings and pictures from magazines to put on their crèche walls to show to guardians. Interactive, creative activities are a great way to learn. Everyone then sat down to a delicious lunch of fresh veg, fruit, peanut butter sandwiches and popcorn!
2 September 2019
Our Second Successful Friend-Raising Event
We would like to thank everyone who organised, contributed and attended our first two Friend-Raising events at Zeiler Jankey, a law firm in Durban North and Eagles View, a yoga centre in Winston Park. Great fun was had by all and both events were very successful. We look forward to being involved in your gathering soon.
2 September 2019
Drawing workshop
Art teacher Gail Good popped over to Woza Moya whilst visiting the BRC next door, to join our afterschool children offering a fun drawing workshop. Our staff took Gail deeper into the valley to Ntakama hall to visit a group of disabled children who also loved doing some drawings.
1 August 2019
JULY WOZA MOYA NEWS WRAP UP
At the annual Creighton Aloe Festival, we sold our crafts. Congratulations to local farming friend Shirl Moberly who won the beautiful Crafts Hamper in our raffle! Our 3 Child & Youth Care Workers attended the NACCW in Durban. http://www.naccw.org.za/biennial-conferenceThe Woza Moya Community Advisory Council met to discuss operational matters, with half our CCG team being retrenched due to funding shortages. The other half of CCG team attended a week of Primary Health Care training run by our local Health department. Four CCGs attended Caring for the Caregivers course run by Educo Africa www.educo.org.za JAMSA training - nutritional programme extended to 3 outlying crèches.
2 July 2019
WOZA MOYA RAFFLE
We are currently selling Raffle tickets for a beautiful crafts hamper valued at R 1,300.00. Tickets cost R20.00 per ticket and there is no limit to how many you can buy. To buy a ticket email: office@wozamoya.org.za or you can make a donation using PayPal or Zapper (on our DONATE page) - Be sure to put your name and ‘Raffle’ on your donation.
2 July 2019
Creighton Aloe Festival
Woza Moya Ixopo will have a craft stall set up at the Creighton Aloe Festival 2019 and will be selling a wide variety of our locally crafted goods. Be sure to join us for a great day out at a beautiful venue. See you at the Aloe Festival on 6 & 7 JULY 2019! For more information out the event visit: www.creightonaloefestival.com
31 MAY 2019
VISIT FROM WITS
Highlight of May was academics Hamsa Venkat and Prof Mike Askew from WITS University in Johannesburg, facilitating a workshop on early Maths Development for all the ECD Practitioners in the Ufafa Valley. Hamsa and Mike run a research and development project on primary maths in Gauteng, focussing on materials and teacher development. Descriptions of the work and freely downloadable materials are available on their website: http://www.wits.ac.za/wits-maths-connect/wits-maths-connect-primary/ Hamsa and Mike were the most awesome team to watch in action! Taking all day just to teach/learn the numbers 1-5 had participants riveted! Their innovative, fun methods and exciting activities made everyone love this workshop. Woza Moya friend and volunteer Janet Lazarus, who supports Maths teachers in Inanda, Durban, also attended this workshop, offering to do the vital follow up support and training for all 9 crèches attending this training. We look forward to seeing some great Mathematicians coming out of the Ufafa Valley!
30 April 2019
Enabling Play at Woza Moya
Three of our Child Care Workers , Phindile Mazeka, Sinethemba Ndlovu, and Thembelephi Chiliza were recently awarded their certificates of completion from A Chance To Play Southern Africa Distance Training Course. Well done ladies! The Woza Moya team is very proud!
2 APRIL 2019
HELLO MAMAS
In March Woza Moya began a new partnership with MAMAS from the Netherlands childrensfundmamas.com. We are thrilled to be associated with this new family of like-minded MAMAS in SA.
2 APRIL 2019
OUR NEW Website Goes live!
After a few months of hard work we are thrilled to finally launch our new Woza Moya site! Welcome and enjoy :)