The Run Home to Read Project, our ECD family literacy programme, was launched in June 2006 and it has become very popular. In spite of a setback during COVID, it continues to reach more families every year. Project Literacy designed ‘Run Home to Read’ (RHTR) to tackle the absence of Early Childhood Development (ECD) provision for poor rural, peri-urban and township children by involving parents and caregivers in developing their children’s early literacy skills at home, from babyhood onwards.

Later the little children find it easier to benefit from their formal education at school. Intervention to support children from disadvantaged backgrounds in the very early years has been shown to be more effective than efforts to support later on. Birth to five years is the key period to provide a foundation for lifelong learning.