![]() Through those prizes, eKitabu has delivered more than 120 born-accessible African language EPUBS to the GDL. “ Growing up, I read my way through school because teachers were not able to sign, and I couldn’t understand what was said in class,” Auma says.ĮKitabu’s Begin With Books project, called Open Books Malawi, will scale work begun in Kenya and Rwanda through ACR GCD’s Book Boost : Access for All Challenge and Sign On For Literacy prizes. No materials in Malawian Sign Language exist at all.Īuma, who grew up in Kenya and became deaf at age 9, previously served as a teacher to deaf students and now leads eKitabu’s Studio KSL and RSL (Rwandan Sign Language) projects, funded previously through ACR GCD’s Sign On For Literacy prize. In Malawi, lack of access to quality books in local languages is even more acute: only 10 storybooks exist in Tumbuka, a language spoken by more than 2 million people, and none are offered in accessible formats – such as books in audio, braille, large print or with sign language videos. That challenge stems, in part, from the lack of quality, accessible reading materials in languages children use and understand. Globally, more than 387 million children of primary school age are not achieving minimum proficiency in reading, even though two-thirds of those children are in school. Tech can also help lower the cost and make it sustainable.” “It’s a really simple and powerful thing, and tech really opens an opportunity, particularly for creating accessible, local language books. “Can you even imagine learning how to read without storybooks?” said Matt Utterback, co-founder of eKitabu. The books will be uploaded to the Global Digital Library (GDL), a web-based platform that offers free, high-quality early learning resources in more than 40 languages. Content that is “born accessible” is created with accessibility features at the onset, eliminating the cost of time and resources required to retrofit an existing book with those features. As a winner of ACR GCD’s Begin With Books prize, eKitabu will create 270 born-accessible e-books - 220 in Tumbuka and 50 in Malawian Sign Language (MSL)-for early grade children in Malawi who have few to no books in these languages. It’s this same feeling of hope and fulfillment that Auma and the team at eKitabu wish to bring to the children of Malawi. Positioned beside a large television, Auma laughs and connects with the students as she plays sign language storybooks on the screen and asks and answers questions in the Kenyan Sign Language she shares in common with the students. ![]() Through the Begin With Books prize, eKitabu will create 270 born-accessible e-books-220 in Tumbuka and 50 in Malawian Sign Language (MSL)-for early grade children in Malawi who have few to no books in these languages.Īt a school for the deaf in Kenya, Georgine Auma stands at the front of a packed classroom of students.
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