Local non-profit developed app for early development centres
The organisation developed a version of the app for early childhood development centre owners, one for teachers who work in the centres and another version specifically for the parents of children at the centres.
A LOCAL non-profit organisation called Grow ECD has taken it upon themselves to equip early development centres with a tool – in the form of an app – that will assist them in making their daily operations quick and more effective. Anele Chitha, a community development coordinator, spoke to Berea Mail about the app that Grow ECD has developed with ECD centres in mind.
“In 2020, we came up with an idea to create an app that could be utilised by our staff on the ground at these early development centres, to ease the load of their daily tasks. We then created three apps, each specific to a different group but all affiliated with ECD centres,” said Chitha.
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The organisation developed the Giraffe app, specifically created for ECD owners to help them with their administration, daily registers and management of their finances. One of the apps, called the Meerkat app, was designed for teachers who work in these centres. But, the leading app was the Lion app, which was specifically designed with the parents in mind.
“We have made a means of teaching people how our app works because even in developing it, we made sure that even someone who isn’t tech savvy can easily operate the app to get the best out of it. Although it has been well received, other first-time users have been reluctant to use it on a full-time basis,” added Chitha.
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Chitha says that many people, especially first-time users of the app, have been reluctant to use it because they still prefer to physically engage with the next person, and most parents still want to come to the schools to fetch the physical copies of learners’ assessments for their children. Although more people are still familiarising themselves with the apps, the three apps developed by Grow ECD currently have 8 900 registered users, with 2 000 daily users every month.
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