Hi Guys. 

As most of you know I am a primary school teacher. Yikes! Four years ago I NEVER would have thought I'd be saying that. But today I can honestly say that I am so blessed to be doing what I do because I get to meet some truly incredible little people. Each one of the precious little souls I have had the pleasure of teaching have touched my heart in so many ways and ended up teaching me in turn. 

I started my teaching journey in South Africa. A very different educational system from here in the UK. In my final year of Varsity I decided to skip Honors and go for a PGCE. For my first ever teaching experience  I was assigned 3 months in Grade 2 at a township school just outside Grahamstown, called Fikizolo Primary School. Here, children attended school without shoes and often without jerseys in the cold winter, a very different picture to how it is here in the UK. But despite thier empty tummys and frozen feet, everyday they arrived with smiles on thier faces. Everyday they were ready and excited to learn! 

I rocked up fresh faced and ready to teach, but boy did I get a shock that first day. The classroom was a brick shell with a pot-hole filled concrete floor. Three of the four windows were smashed and there was a single teachers desk at the front with a very worn down chalk board. From where they were sitting on the cold concrete floor there were 40 tiny little expectant faces looking up at me, wide eyed and smiling. Never had I been so unprepared! 

There were no books, pens, pencils, rulers or erasers. There was no chalk or paper, desks or chairs. Nothing! That night I went home and cried. The following day I marched down to town and bought 40 pencils, a handful of erasers, some rulers and a few boxes of crayons. I emptied the University's paper recycling boxes and managed to staple together a few pieces of paper into a book for each child. 

When I handed each of those children a pencil and thier 'book' I can not describe in words the wide eyed shock, the smiles of sheer happiness and the screams of delight. These children had never had thier own stationary! Some could hardly hold a pencil at the start of our time together and by the end of the three months they were all writing and drawing away! 

All it took was a few pieces of paper and some pencils. And that's what I'm asking for here. Just one pound can provide 5 books and pencils. 5 pounds can provide 20 books. 100 pounds can help set up classroom libraries and so on. So, if you can, i ask you to help me raise some money to buy some very much needed supplies for some very special little people, and make thier day at school that little bit brighter in time for Christmas and the start of the new school year. 

Basic education is the most important thing a child will receive in thier early life. Having access to basic stationary and books will help them learn and practice thier reading and writing. The joy of seeing a child drawing beautiful pictures or just writing thier name is worth it all.