Young children will be given the opportunity to showcase their spelling, mathematics and story-writing skills at the Western Cape Literacy and Mathematics finals next weekend.
About 18 schools participated in the semi-finals last week, and Jewel Harris, the founder of Growsmart and general manager of Growthpoint Properties Cape Town, said that only eight schools made it to the finals.
The Growsmart Finals will be held at Oude Molen Technical HS on Saturday, September 9, and the prize-giving will be at the Aquarium at the Waterfront.
All these competitions are monitored by Growsmart, an annual Educational Programme that is currently aimed at Grades 4, 5 and 6 in the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and Limpopo.
Participating schools are selected by education departments. A mentor for each school in each subject is responsible to co-ordinate Growsmart at the school.
“Schools that made it to the finals for Literacy are Heideveld Primary School, Eikendal Primary, Delft South Primary School, St Mary's Primary School, and Thornton Primary. And for Mathematics schools that made it to the finals include Dennemere Primary School, St Agnes Primary, Strand Moslem Primary, St John's RC Primary and Hawston Primary,” said Harris.
The MEC for the Western Cape Education Department, David Maynier, said that after months of hard work by the competing teams he would like to wish every competitor and school good luck in the finals.
“This a wonderful competition that contributes towards improving our learners’ reading, writing and calculating skills. It also contributes towards our recovery programme – getting our learners #BackonTrack,” said Maynier.
He also said that not only do the learners “grow smarter” as the competition rolls on, they also get the chance to make new friends, build a sense of teamwork and camaraderie and receive a balanced dose of competitiveness.
“And one simply can’t ignore some of the generous prizes that have been donated by Growthpoint Properties that will help improve facilities and resources at our schools. We thank them for their continued support throughout the years,” added Maynier.
The winning school walks away with R800 000 worth of prizes. Prizes are also awarded to second and third place teams. Every participating learner will receive a certificate of participation, and from the semi-final level to the finals, a certificate and medal.