Elizabeth Kperrun is the winner of the “ICT for Children” Grant, a special recognition offered by Fondazione Mission Bambini within the framework of “ICT for Social Good” Grant. The Grant was created to reward the project that better represents the usage of innovation for childhood. Elizabeth is the co-founder of Lizzie’s Creations, an initiative that aims to revive the African traditional culture and storytelling through digital tools. She creates fun educational mobile apps that teach kids using Africa’s native languages.

By Viviana Brun

Researchers have shown that many children in Africa do not speak their country’s lingua franca (typically English, French, Portuguese or Arabic) as a first language. However, these same children are expected to learn in these languages. This creates a unique problem, making the assimilation of what is being taught harder and generally extends the learning time. According to the UNESCO,  the best way to educate children is through their mother tongue. Fluency and literacy in the native language lay a cognitive and linguistic foundation for learning additional languages. Some people argue that producing learning materials in a variety of African languages is too costly in economic terms. Elizabeth and her team tried to face this issue, creating a suite of mobile applications which educate African children using their native languages.

Elizabeth noticed that there is a lack of culturally relevant educational material for African kids on the popular app stores. So, she started creating quality content that allows kids learning in their native languages, which has been proven to speed up their understanding. The direct beneficiaries are the children aged 1-10 who directly use the apps and learn the basics (Numbers, Letters, Object recognition) as well as important cultural values.

AfroTalez 

“Folk stories were a great part of my childhood. Apart from the obvious entertainment factor, I learnt a lot of life lessons and morals from folk stories and I do not think they are a culture that should be forgotten”, said Elizabeth. Afro Talez is an application that narrates traditional African folk stories, teaches morals and life lessons to children aged from 2 to 10 years old. It’s an app structured in episodes, the first story is already available and it’s titled “The Tortoise, Elephant and the Hippopotamus”. This story extols the intelligence of folk hero ‘Mr. Tortoise’, who usually faces and overcomes challenges in new and unexpected ways. If you are wondering about the advantages of going digital, in the app you will find some features as interactive games on standard classroom lessons such as counting, object recognition and more. Download the app and start exploring Lizzie’s Creations world.

Teseem, first words

Teseem-First Words is the second app series developed by Lizzie’s Creations. This app teaches kids their first words in English as well as in some major African and Nigerian languages, including Hausa, Swahili, Igbo and Yoruba, by using locally relevant scenes and objects children are familiar with. For example, they could learn words related to colours, numbers, body parts and more just touching the screen and interacting with the nice animation.

A freemium business plan

The two apps are monetized using in-app purchases. Users can download the app and use it for free, but there is certain content that is available for a small fee or via rewarded video ads that allow users to unlock the premium content for a few hours by viewing a targeted relevant video.

Go to Elizabeth interview.

Photocredits: Lizzie’s Creations