How YOU can help Edward //Garoëb Primary School with School Supplies

Updated 10/9

To further continue our theme of---How YOU can help Edward //Garoëb Primary School

This week’s theme: School Supplies

Well, it’s soon going to be autumn in the States (if it isn’t already.) That means apples, fall leaves, and school sales. With school sales starting, this is the perfect time to cheaply buy a few extra school supplies. “And where should we send these extra school supplies?” I hear you asking. Well I’m glad you asked, to ME of course, (well, more properly, to my school and to the teachers.) In Namibia school doesn’t start until January, so if the supplies get sent in mid to late September that leaves a good 2 months for shipping (and anytime we receive them they will be appreciated. They needn’t be there for the first day of school. Heck, most of the learners aren’t even there for the first day of school.) This year (and we expect that the numbers will be similar next year) there are

• 295 learners in total
• 175 lower primary learners (Grades 1-4)
• 120 upper primary learners (Grades 5-7.)
• 10 teachers including me (two for first grade, one each for grades 2-4, a 5-7 math teacher, a 5-7 social studies teacher, a 5-7 science teacher, a 5-7 KhoeKhoe teacher, and me)
• Photos of some of Amy's students.
• Photos of Amy's classroom
• About Amy's town, home and school
• More about the school
• Amy's Photo page
  

This is my wish list for supplies (not that we need all of these things, but even a few would be nice. This is my “if the world was a perfect place” list, not my realistic thoughts about what we can and can’t get. Don’t get overwhelmed. I don’t expect that even a percentage of this will show up.)

From Paul: If you plan to send or have already sent any of these items or other things not already on this list, let me know and I will post them here (in Red) as a sort of "Anker School Supply Registry". That way you will know what is still needed.

• 9 packages of stickers (The best kind are the packages of 3000 tiny circular motivational stickers because they are cheap, there are plenty of them so they don’t all get used up quickly, and they are relatively uniform but if you collect other kinds they would be appreciated too.)
• 50 protractors (for class use in maths class) (14)
  
• 50 solar calculators (batteries are too expensive in a place where school fees are US$10 a year.) (25)
  
• 50 compasses (24)
  
• 50 set squares
• 1 set of blackboard sized mathematical instruments (compass, protractor, set square, straight edge)
• 300 pens (150)
  
• 300 pencils (so each learner can have one of each) (360+)
  
• 300 rulers (43) (They are a little obsessed with straight lines and will wait until someone is done with a ruler rather than draw a line without one which, I can attest, can actually drive a teacher crazy.)
• 300 pencil sharpeners (at the moment they use these curved razor blades that make me worry that one day they’re going to stick someone.)
• 10 Wall mount Pencil sharpeners (1)
  
• Erasers (34 individual, 132 pencil erasers)
  
• 10-20 English Dictionaries (the best kind are children’s picture dictionaries or student dictionaries not the OED or some complete dictionary since the definitions are hard for the kids or even the adults to understand. There is no such thing as too many dictionaries, we can always always always use more.) (20 paperback .97 ones from Walmart)
  
• Maps of the world, the continents, and other maps
• Globes of the world (2 inflatable "beach ball" kind)
  
• Educational Posters (with the letters, numbers, multiplication, math concepts, library skills, pictures of authors (especially children’s authors and black authors), historical things, the solar system, weather, science stuff, body parts, colors, animals, shapes, posters that encourage reading, really anything educational or with English words on it.)
• 10 staplers with staples (1 plus 1 box of 500 staples)
  
• tape (2)
  
• plasti-tak (1 package)
  
• lots and lots of boxes of crayons (118 boxes of 24 count)
  
• boxes of markers (14 boxes of 10 count)
  
• boxes of colored pencils (14)
  
• dry paint (like watercolors, don’t even try to send me bottles of wet paint. Trust me, that’s asking for disaster.) (5 - 8-color boxes, package of 10 brushes)
  
• Colored paper (Construction Paper )
  
• Tapes or CDs of children’s music in English
• flash cards (especially Maths- the kids have a lot of trouble with multiplication facts mainly because they haven’t had it drilled into them with flash cards, but if you can find flash cards with English words on them they would also be appreciated.) (1 of Addition, 4 of Subtraction, 1 of Multiplication, 1 of Division, 1 of Alphabet, 1 of Sightwords)
  
• Anything else that has to do with education
• scissors (6 childrens 2 adult)
• glue stix (52)
• Foam Alphabet blocks (2 packages)
• box of thumbtacks and 100 pushpins
• box of rubber bands
• Foam shapes
• Paper clips, pencil cushions
  
• 2 boxes of lacing cards
• Phonics tiles, puzzles, stencils (zoo), wipe off phrase strips, wipeoff books and wipeoff markers
• Linking preschool shapes
• 8 wood puzzles in a slotted puzzle box
  

Notebooks are only kind of useful. Learners are provided with two notebooks for every subject by the government of Namibia so any notebooks would be mainly used by teachers or possibly by learners before the notebooks are delivered. Anyway, a few would probably get used, but we don’t need 300 notebooks and we need a lot of other supplies more. Also important-these things are NOT useful—Three hole punches or binders with three rings (everything here works with two rings that are closer together), things that only use the English system (as opposed to the Metric system) but that doesn’t apply to rulers since they mainly use them to make straight lines not to measure things, and things that are ONLY applicable to the United States (for example, a poster about the system of government in the US, but don’t let that hold you back too much if you have stuff, for example they still use maps of the United States in Social Studies. Also, kids get more excited about things that have to do with Africa, but they are also interested in different cultures and yes, the US is a different culture.)

You can choose how you want to get the stuff to me. You can either send it in the mail to me:

Edward //Garoëb Primary School

Private Bag 5006

Kamanjab, Namibia

AFRICA

Or you can get it to my mom and dad. They are going to visit me in December and they are planning on each packing one of their two suitcases with donated stuff for the school. If you choose to mail it to me be sure you choose a very sturdy box, you tape it thoroughly, and you pad anything even kind of breakable (like plastic protractors or calculators.) Also, be sure to mark that they are donated school supplies and not worth money on the customs form (I haven’t had to pay customs fees yet, but some other volunteers have.)

Contact Paul and Nancy if you have questions or want their address:

Their email is ppedersen6 at charter dot net

Thank you for all of your support for me. As for information about the copier- I will definitely be buying it when I go to Windhoek. I will send lots of pictures and thank you notes once I get it back to Anker.

Link to the Page about the successful copier project.

Link to the page about the ongoing Library Project