Karina Strydom was a high school teacher; her fascination with early childhood development was sparked when both her sons were born with club feet and she felt that she needed to compensate by concentrating on developing their minds. Her programme, based on Glenn Doman’s work and the Montessori school principles, was so successful that she became extremely passionate about sharing it with other parents. In 1999 Karina started ‘The Reading Generation’ with three franchises that organised workshops for parents in the northern suburbs. She gave the same training to pre-school teachers in Soweto.
In 2003, Karina designed and launched the financial board game, ‘Running with Bulls’ which was endorsed by the JSE. She also presented a financial series on DSTV about Children and Money. She applied the same principles at work and at home and, today, she recounts numerous stories about her two young sons, who used to read the newspaper in the back of her car on the way to school and had made some significant investment decisions by the time they reached their early tweens.
Hendrik Marais and Karina Strydom launched BrainBoosters in 2011. They share a passion and vision for raising literacy and numeracy skills in South Africa and believe the best way to accomplish this is preparing children before they go to school by helping them build an adequate vocabulary, strong number concept, knowledge of colours, shapes and a general love of books. Only parents or primary caregivers can lay that foundation, but they need the right tools and support.
Karina’s main goal is that every child in South Africa starts school having learnt the basic building blocks necessary for future learning, and that the work that BrainBoosters has begun goes from strength to strength, seriously impacting literacy and numeracy in South Africa. BrainBoosters was nominated as a finalist in three categories and won two categories at the annual SABC EduWeek Gala evening and prize giving in June 2016.
In ‘How to teach your children about money,’ Karina will share practical ideas of how to use money and introduce maths concepts. Even very young children can learn how to spend, save, and value money – if it is real money. You can see her at 9am on Sunday 6th November at the Working Mothers Expo. To learn more about Karina and her vision, visit the Brainboosters Website.
The Working Mothers Expo, brought to you in partnership with MiWayLife, brings together everything working mothers need under one roof. 4-6 November 2016. Sandton Convention Centre. Meet our MCs, Elana Afrika and Claire Mawisa, at the Speakers Corner.
If you would like to inquire about sponsoring or exhibiting at the event, please email us and we will send you all the details you need.
Tickets available at Computicket