General Event

After an exciting Heritage month (see reports under WORKSHOPS) we are back to Saturday Stories at Butterfly Centre. The themes will relate to bravery and coping with life – including the dreaded exams that will be upon us after the current school holidays. Dates for workshops will be: Saturday 6th (holiday workshop) Saturday 20th (Song […]

Making children happy is one of the most important objectives of CBN. Yes, we are about books and reading. But the children who come to our workshops are exposed to other things as well. We aim to make them happy. Our workshops follow a theme – lately it has been Imagination – or as the

Theme: Music and Story. Music and Books Dates: Monday 2 July to Wednesday 4 July Venue: Butterfly Centre The Winter Workshops in the school holidays will run from 10.00 am to 2.00 and will include a healthy snack to start and lunch at 12.30. Musical input will come from a group of Hermanus High boys

We currently have two new projects under way – the locally run workshops given by Vuyo Siza in Stanford, and the Mitchell’s Plain and Khayelitsha workshops with Blaq Pearl and Primrose Mrwebi. Toolbox development continues apace as well. It is a busy start to a busy year. Image: Primrose Mrwebi at toolbox handover in the

The new toolboxes are in production – we are ordering the books and the materials we need to have two full toolboxes with our two stalwart facilitators who will be beginning a ten month programme of workshops in two different areas of Cape Town – Mitchell’s plain and Khayelitsha. CBN is braced for the launch

CBN has got off to a cracking start in 2018 with new projects in view and old projects continuing. This is going to be a landmark year for us and for the children we work with. We are particularly happy to welcome Gcina Mhlophe as our Patron. Her message for the new year? ‘Shine on!’

Next year there will be more of you. There will be more workshops, more toolboxes, more stories, more drawing and making things, more people coming to talk to you; more events and excursions. Next year we will give more, read more, have more fun. And that’s a promise.

This last year has marked a significant change for CBN as we moved from being a small group of friends doing what we were able to – to being a larger group of friends tackling bigger projects. The need for the work we do has also grown. Reading, for the age group we work with

CBN will be doing some informal workshops in November and December with the children, fitting around their exam schedules. Lesley and Chantel will also be talking to 30 librarians of the Winelands and Overstrand Districts on 10 November – about the toolbox project. Lesley and Primrose will be giving a workshop for the children at

We are expanding our new project – Our World – to reach children in Gansbaai (where we are talking to the municipal library), Hermanus and Stanford. Each child involved in the project will produce their own book (which they will take home when it is finished) and CBN hopes to produce, and self-publish – and

We will be kick-starting a new season of workshops with a new project called Our World, where we will be looking at the heritage as well as the environment of the children we work with. The first workshop will be in Stanford on Saturday 23 September, hopefully at Butterfly Centre (to be confirmed). This theme

As we did last year, we will be holding a two-day workshop in Hermanus, on 3 and 4 July at Enlighten Education Trust in Zwelihle with a star-studded cast! Blaq Pearl will be working her magic with poetry and song, various people will give input on their work in environmental education and share stories with

In the first of three April workshops, Stanford children visited Overberg Honey and had an incredible time. Our thanks to Nadia and Daniel for the opportunity and to Nauthando and Aaron for the excellent and informative tour. Home

Bees and Butterflies are on the programme with a visit to the Overberg Honey Company to create entries for a honey-bee art competition and a workshop at the Butterfly Centre, which could … just … feature butterflies! We are also planning a workshop with Red Hill children later in April – more news on that

CBN has been extremely busy during January with forward planning and toolbox developments – as well as strategic planning meetings. But none of that has meant enough direct contact with children, which is what we are about, after all, so we are looking forward to World Read Aloud Day on 16th February, when we will

We have a special new year’s message to all of you from friend and founder Gcina Mhlophe ‘As a person who has felt the joy of reading a good book again and again, it is my wish to share this special feeling with the children of our country. I wish you light and courage in

This month of November sees us nearing completion of the first of three planned toolboxes – and they are even more exciting than we had hoped. Our workshops are very intense. They can’t be done with hundreds of children at a time. But we wanted to spread our methods to reach more young people –

From the outset, CBN has been blessed with friends. This is in every sense of the word – people who listen at dinner parties, people who come along and share their expertise in anything from archaeology to playing the cello, people who donate books; people who give their time to serve on our board. There

CBN will, once again, be holding holiday workshops in Stanford during the holidays – and we will be doing more trialling of our toolboxes! Watch this space for more information.

On Saturday 10th September, CBN will be presenting the toolboxes to a team of dedicated librarians working under the auspices of the Franschhoek Literary Festival Library Fund. A group of Grade Fives will join us for the demonstration.