Creating a Culture of Reading
As a result of the global pandemic which has resulted in so many children being far behind the expected literacy levels we have changed our strategy and are focussing on every child in Grade 1,2 and 3 and our primary objective is to address systemic challenges at home and in the classroom room which prevent children from learning to read and write at grade level.
Creating a Culture of Reading at Home
Our focus is to ensure that every child in the Foundation Phase receives a quarterly literacy resource pack with the objective of having their own reading and writing resources. This is enhanced by messaging for parents where we are driving a ‘read with your child’ campaign using Paired and Shared Reading methodology. Using WhatsApp, we send weekly messages to the teachers who share them with the parents/caregivers. In this way, we communicate with the parents of these children, without needing to increase our internal human capacity.
In term one of 2022, we distributed 9 355 Resource Packs to Foundation Phase learners in 43 schools across four provinces (Western Cape, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape).
Creating a Culture of Reading at School
More than ever schools need to be a place where the daily reading of books and writing activities are a priority. To this end Shine Literacy staff will work closely with the school principals, governing body, teachers and HODs of both Foundation Phase and Intermediate Phase, Western Cape Education Department (WCED) officials, and a number of other key stakeholders that also support the school to ensure that systems, policies, activities, and daily behaviour reinforces a love of books, storytelling, individualised reading practice, and creative writing.
A quarterly Community of Practice is planned for each school to attend where teachers will be sharing best practice, new initiatives, and current methodology with like-minded individuals within the literacy space in education. The emphasis is that these activities need to be school-based and school-led. Each Foundation Phase class will have a trained Youth Reading Partner that will ensure that every child has individualised reading each day and takes home a reader too.