Education
“My dream is to reconnect the children of
South Africa with nature.”
ZOLANI MAHOLA
VOCALIST, SEA CHANGE PROJECT AMBASSADOR
EMPOWERING THE NEXT GENERATION
Connecting people to nature through the Great African Seaforest and our original language with the wild.
Having a connection to nature is everyone’s birthright. Our love for the Great African Seaforest is built on our daily experiences of diving and tracking in this extraordinary place. However for many South Africans who are geographically close to the ocean, there are still many barriers to entry that prevent them from having meaningful access to the sea.
We are committed to sharing our love and knowledge of the Great African Seaforest, with as many people as we can reach, to grow a nature-based community of ocean and Seaforest ambassadors.
My Octopus Teacher was the foundation of our education impact campaign. Together with partner organisations, we undertook community film tours of My Octopus Teacher, starting in South Africa.
Our aim was to reach audiences who otherwise would not have access to this film and to create a learning environment around the importance of the Great African Seaforest, and the interconnectedness of humans and nature. Educational resources include social media tools and action guides.
As humans, our relationship with nature started millions of years ago, long before the rise of Homo sapiens or the spoken word. To survive on planet Earth without the technology we have today, we were entirely dependent on the natural world and in order to understand our environment, we developed an incredible language based on the signs and sounds of the wild: that language was tracking. Led by Craig Foster and based on relationships we have built with local organisations over many years, we have embarked on a tracker tracking program which aims to work with small groups and expose them to the lives of our ancestors and the ecology of our coastline through the language of tracking.
