This study examined the role of family literacy practices in children’s development of literacy skills in Botswana. The study addressed one main research question and seven sub-questions. The main research question was “how do parents promote early literacy development of children?” Purposive sampling was used to obtain the sample for the study and fourteen parents of the University of Botswana Child Development Laboratory participated in the study. This qualitative study used in-depth interviews with the participants, and questionnaire for data collection. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analyzed in line with the phenomenological approach. The findings indicated that parents of the University of Botswana Child Development Laboratory owned and used various literacy materials and resources to enhance their children’s literacy skills development. It also became apparent that the parents engaged various unstructured activities to enhance children’s literacy development in their homes. Furthermore, the study identified time constraint as a major challenge that parents faced. / Department of Family and Consumer Sciences

The Botswana National Literacy Programme (BNLP) was officially launched in 1981 as a major adult literacy initiative. Literacy was in this case defined as reading, writing and calculating. However, experience over the years of implementation showed that provision of the 3Rs is not enough but literacy needs to be made functional in order to be useful to the learners in their daily lives. Income generating projects were therefore introduced to the National literacy programme as a way of making literacy functional. It has been realized however that the BNLP supported income generating projects are failing or not doing well. The aim of this study was therefore to investigate the performance of income generating projects supported by BNLP in relation to projects meeting member' objectives, group dynamics, economic growth, members' health status, commitment to the projects, use of literacy skills in running the projects, conducting feasibility studies before embarking on income-generating projects, business management, availability of start up finance and follow up. Hypotheses of this study stated that the BNLP-supported income generating projects are failing because of projects not satisfying members' needs, group disputes among group members, lack of growth, ill health lack of members' commitment to the projects, inappropriate literacy curriculum, inadequate feasibility studies before starting the projects, business management, lack of finance and lack of follow up after training. The methodologies used for this study were participatory and survey research. Qualitative strategies were employed using focus group discussions, force field analysis, observations and questionnaires. Stratified random sampling, was employed to select the sampled population often operating and ten non-operating income-generating projects in the South East, Southern and Northern regions of Botswana. Purposive sampling was employed to select all twelve trainers of the income generating projects within the same regions. The results of this study were analysed using SPSS 11.5, and manual inspection. The results of this study supported this hypothesis to a great extent in that causes of failure of the projects were because the personal objectives of project members were not met, there was a problem of group disputes among members, ill health of some members was affecting their production, literacy skills learnt in literacy and income generating skills provided by BNLP were not adequate to be used in the running of the project and business skills are taught separately from the basic literacy skills of reading and writing and numeracy. Feasibility studies were not conducted before embarking on income generating projects and there was mismanagement of the projects. Inadequate follow up was also seen to be one of the contributory factors to the failure of projects. Hypothesis of this study was also partially rejected in a sense that, the results showed that almost all the projects received some grants to start their projects and therefore start up finances were not a problem but rather a problem of shortage of funds for expansion, Lack of ensuring sustainability of projects was due to mismanagement of the funds by the office bearers and mostly LGLs. Recommendations of this study directed to income generating-project members included settling group disputes, conducting feasibility studies, embarking on relevant projects individually or as groups. Policy recommendations included support of individual and group projects, running a pilot project where appropriate literacy needs of the piloted projects will be provided, involvement of the participants in decision-making concerning their projects and curriculum. The policy recommendation included ensuring that funds are only given to viable projects and literacy curriculum is relevant to the running of income generating projects to ensure sustainability. Recommendations for further studies included BNLP conducting an in-depth study to establish the prospects and problems of group approach in income generating activities, investigate the level of skills that the BNLP supported income-generating projects and their trainers possess and their specific needs for skills development and lastly evaluate the training materials used in both literacy classes and income-generation training to get more insight on what is lacking, and how this could be improved. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2006.

The purpose of this study was to deternine the use and application of information communication technologies (ICTs) by the library workers of the University of Botswana Library. ICTs play an important role in a library environment because they enable libraries to be accessed rapidly as well as increasing the range, relevance and accessibility of information provided by the libraries. ICTs are therefore important for supporting the library workers in their everyday roles. This research was done with a view to propose recommendations which may enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of University of Botswana Library workers in facilitating timely, relevant, accurate and reliable access to information for the library users through the utilisation of ICTs. The population of the research was the University of Botswana Library and its branches namely the Faculty of Engineering Library in Gaborone, the Centre for Continuing Education Branch in Francistown and the Harry Oppenheimer Branch in Maun. Primary and secondary sources of data were used to meet the objectives of the study. The research was done using a self-administered questionnaire, observation and interviews. The response rate was 67 (86.36 %) out of a population of 88. The data collected for this study identified that the University of Botswana Library workers had limitations on the use and application of ICTs as well as varying levels of skills and knowledge on their utilisation. The library workers lack ICT skills because they are only trained for specific routine tasks. In addition, some workers do not have enthusiasm to learn on their own. / Thesis (MIS.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2002.

Modern day society is characterised by the availability of technology and the abundance of information in all formats that require all individuals using it to poses information literacy skills (ILS).ILS enable people the ability to locate, analyse, evaluate access and retrieve the desired information to satisfy a need. Research on IL in academic and school libraries has gained momentum in the field of Information Science where as little has been documented concerning public libraries and IL. This therefore calls for more research on IL in public libraries. Public libraries serve a wide and diverse community of which students are a part. In instances where school libraries are either non-existent or not developed, students seek assistance from the public library within their community. This study sought to investigate the role of public libraries in enhancing the ILS of senior secondary school students in the Central District in Botswana. The fact that school libraries in Botswana are underdeveloped to produce competent and confident students equipped with ILS that could be used in the work environment and continuous lifelong learning, motivated the study. A concern that there exists a gap in research concerning public libraries and IL within the Botswana context necessitated this study. The study used a survey research design where both quantitative and qualitative research approaches were adopted. This involved the collection and analysis of quantitative and qualitative data. The purpose of a mixed methods approach was based on the idea that qualitative results could assist in explaining and interpreting the findings of a quantitative study. Data collection involved three sets of closed ended questionnaires and observations in all schools and public libraries. The population of the study consisted of public librarians, teacher librarians and students. Quantitative data were analysed using the Statistical Packages for Social Sciences (SPSS) to generate statistics. The findings of the study revealed that the public libraries in the Central District in Botswana are above average in terms of materials and use. It brought to light that senior secondary schoolstudents use the public libraries for school purposes and get assistance when they seek for it. Public librarians do not have special classes aimed at enhancing the ILS of students. The public libraries offer IL in the form of computer training, they do this as, and when students register, just like the other members of the community. The library’s contribution to enhancement of the students’ ILS, (study skills, reading skills and use of reference works) is somewhat limited. Limited resources, lack of reading culture, low budgets, and lack of support from government negatively challenge the full potential impact of IL enhancement. / Information Science / M.A. Information Science