What is Mandhwane?

Mandhwane is an African learning pedagogy that was widely practiced in Southern Africa as a traditional educational system long before Western schooling was introduced. It involved the creation of children’s villages after the harvest season. The children’s villages served as open spaces where children learned through experimentation, storytelling, and guidance from elders.

The villages nurtured collaboration, creativity, and critical thinking, all rooted in everyday life and community values. Digital Mandhwane is the modern evolution of this tradition, reclaiming cultural practices by creating both offline and online digital spaces where learners can engage, collaborate, and develop skills in ways that are culturally grounded in African knowledge systems and intergenerational learning.In essence, Digital Mandhwane is a place where people come together to learn. Learning can be through using digital technologies to learn about anything, but it can also be about learning to be a programmer. People who learn digital skills and make new things using digital technologies are known as innovators.