Our vision
Book Dash believes that every child should own one hundred books by the age of five.
To that end, we gather creative professionals who volunteer to create new, African storybooks that anyone can freely translate, print and distribute. In this way, we have vastly reduced the costs involved in putting high-quality books in children’s hands and hearts.
Our history
Book Dash began in 2014 as a vision project among friends who wished to pool their collective skills in the publishing industry to flood the country with new, high-quality, affordable African picture books for all. Since then, we’ve created more than 100 books and distributed more than a million copies. We’ve also received multiple awards for our innovative approach and top quality open content.
“Shhhh! is at the perfect level for the little ones I see: There is a dog that barks, a phone that rings, a truck that brmmms, a ball that bounces! It’s helping me both with children learning language and increasing vocabulary, but also with my non-verbal AAC users (augmentative and alternative communicators) who are non verbal but are using pictures to communicate: I can match their own picture of a ball to the ball in the story…Excellent language stimulation opportunities all round!”
Jamie Sareli,
Speech Therapist at Red Cross Cerebral Palsy Unit
“When I was trying to get a good source of reading I barely found any for a beginner…then I found your app. [Reading the books] not only improved her reading skills, but also her confidence and that’s when we thought we could share it with kids by reading aloud.”
Ruth’s KidAdventure
“We love Book Dash books! They are an amazing tool to use in a variety of ways to help focus our educational interventions more clearly to meet our desired outcomes. We use the books in a variety of ways from knowing colour and shapes to spelling and maths, while also developing comprehension, reading skills and a love of reading.”
Tshepong Children’s Project
“I am very grateful that I could start my multi-lingual picture book app BookaBooka off with some publicly available content! I was amazed with the quality of the illustrations of some of the books. The ability to change the pictures and the story itself was key in being able to use this content. Thank you for this broad license. “
Sjors Miltenburg,
BrainBro
“Having books of their own at home makes children proud and encourages them to read more. The Book Dash books provided wonderful stories that children can read and understand in their own time, which helps make reading more accessible. We love this project and how happy it makes children to own their own books.”
Thanda Afterschool Project,
Distribution Partner
Info for community-based organisations
Qualifying organisations can apply to become distribution partners of Book Dash books.
How we use our funds
Our funding partners, whether their funding is destined for operational expenses or for book-printing, comment with delight that they get more bang (or books) for their bucks because of our economical approach to the management of creating new books and printing at scale to reduce unit costs.
Donate to Book Dash
We’d like to put one million books in the hands of children by the end of 2020 and you can help us reach that goal!