About Storybooks

The Early Childhood Development (ECD) Series was developed with support from UNICEF Zimbabwe through the Education Development Fund which is supported by UK Aid and KFW.

The ECD series is designed for children from 0-6 years in both formal and non-formal settings, to encourage them to experience reading in a safe environment with love and care. It provides an interactive tool for parents and caregivers to stimulate children’s development and increase child and caregiver interaction to instil a love for reading. These books will be distributed widely in Zimbabwe, to pre-primary, Grade 1 and Grade 2 classes in targeted schools as well as to communities who are engaged with parenting support programmes. Additionally, they will be used for supplementary psycho-social support materials during emergencies.

Children love to be read, sung and talked with, and listened to. The important thing is the relationship between caregiver and child. Babies sit on the lap of a caregiver and enjoy the love, security and sound of the voice of someone who loves them. A toddler will often “pretend” to read a book after a caregiver reads it many times. And a preschool child will begin to learn the words on the page. Please encourage all of these, as well as encouraging children to tell their own stories and explore books on their own.