Lively Minds is a small grassroots international development charity. We're improving the quality of life for deprived children and their families in rural Ghana and Uganda by developing low-cost education and hygiene programmes that are run by the communities themselves. Our local staff set up Play Centres for children aged 3-6 and Reading Schemes for all and train volunteers from the communities to run the centres themselves, so that once set up children will continue to benefit for years to come. Children learn key skills through play (such as numeracy, problem solving) and volunteers are empowered and learn skills such as teamworking and leadership. Since we started in 2008 we've set up our programmes in 41 communities across rural Uganda and Ghana, changing lives for over 5,000 children per year. Over the next 2 years we're scaling up and aim to setup in at least 30 more communities.