A Watford mum-of-two created an e-book to help parents with home schooling before donating all the money raised to the NHS.
Zahra Boyd, a teacher at Little Learners Education, crafted the resource during the pandemic and has since scooped this year’s Children’s Education Specialist of the Year award at the London & South East Prestige Awards.
The book provides low prep, inexpensive ways to entertain children, whilst stimulating learning and development in fun and engaging ways at home.
Zahra, 39, said: “I wanted to help parents with young children, in a free, friendly and accessible way.
“I have two little ones and understand, particularly during the lockdowns, how tricky it can be to think of different ideas to keep children engaged and also stimulating skills and knowledge through play, using readily available materials in the home.”
Voluntary donations offered in receipt of the book, were sent to NHS Charities Together via a Just Giving page with £300 raised within one week.
To date she continues to share daily ideas via her social media pages, which are all easy to replicate for teachers, parents and carers.
One parent who appreciated Zahra’s creations is accountant Ana Doy, 41, who said she stumbled across it on Facebook.
Ana added: “The resources completely took away the stress from me looking for or thinking of new ideas every day and also took away the mum guilt as all three of my children were learning in a fun way we all enjoy!
"I can’t thank her enough for all the great free content through the lockdowns!”
The mum-of-three also described Zahra as “friendly, approachable and extremely helpful” and said she helped provide support when home schooling began to overwhelm her.
Each of the book’s 64 activities provide easy step-by-step instructions to replicate the learning experience at home, along with an accompanying video link.
There are nine chapters covering multiple areas from phonics and maths games to sensory and creative activities, science investigations, recipes, mark making and fine motor play.
Voluntary donations, on downloading the electronic booklet, were made directly to the NHS Charities Together via the JustGiving page link in the e-book.
The NHS is particularly close to Zahra’s heart as prior to becoming a teacher she worked as dietitian and to date her mother is a neonatal nurse working on a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
To access the book visit the JustGiving page here.
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