Johannesburg - According to a recent survey, 75% of South African parents feel the demanding pace of life reduces their opportunities to spend as much quality time with their children as they would like.
To make a difference, Cadbury Dairy Milk has introduced the “Generously Give a Voice to Story Time” initiative, which aims to bring families together.
Lara Sidersky, Mondelez SA category lead for Chocolate, says: “As a brand that is rooted in the spirit of generosity and bringing people closer together, Cadbury has been on a three-year journey with the nation of storytellers to curate a digital library of 1 500 relatable children’s stories in all 11 South African languages.
“The next stage of this journey is to bring these stories to life by adding South African voices to the digital library and ensuring that children throughout the country continue to enjoy story time.”
Give a Voice to Story Time
Cadbury’s “Generously Give a Voice to Story Time” initiative makes story time more accessible and enjoyable by offering South Africans the opportunity to step back from their busy lives and enjoy a magical audio story in their home language with their loved ones.
Cadbury partnered with local personalities Shekhinah, Rorisang Thandekiso, Yoza Mnyanda-Siboto and Jak de Priester, who have generously given their voices to narrate stories from the library in a variety of local languages.
“Story time presents a great opportunity to bond with my daughter. It’s a chance to teach her and a chance to explore creativity and imagination with her. There’s nothing I love more than watching her eyes light up when her favourite part of a story is drawing near,” comments content creator, musician, mom and story enthusiast Yoza Siboto of Darkie Fiction.
Experts agree that there are countless benefits to investing in creating a ritual of story time with children, which include:
⦁ Life skills: stories introduce children to new experiences and concepts, opening the world around them and expanding their imagination as well as their beliefs about what is possible.
⦁ Empathy and emotional awareness: exposing children to stories about people with different lives and perspectives gives them an appreciation for others’ feelings, cultures and lifestyles. Consciously engaging and interacting makes a child feel heard and seen, which builds self-esteem, develops positive behaviours, and encourages communication and social interaction.
⦁ The parent-child bond: story time provides consistent, focused bonding time without distractions.
⦁ Language development: story time helps maximise children’s language and cognitive capacity by exposing them to new vocabulary and sentence structures and expanding their language abilities.
South Africans can also share the magic of story time by visiting a Cadbury Generosity Story Time Studio and adding their voice to a home-grown story for other families to enjoy. The Cadbury Generosity Story Time Studio has been visiting Sandton City (Johannesburg), Gateway Shopping Centre (KwaZulu-Natal), Tygervalley Mall (Cape Town), and Menlyn Shopping Mall (Pretoria) from May to July.
“We look forward to seeing the positive impact this initiative will have on all South Africans and seeing them share many special moments with their loved ones,” adds Sidersky.
To enjoy story time with your family, visit Cadbury.co.za to select an audio story in your home language and get started. It has all the details about Cadbury’s Homegrown Stories Audio Library. Also follow the conversation using #CadburyGiveAVoice.
The Star