The Department of Arts and Culture took their “Go Back to School Imbizo and Flag Hoisting Campaign” to the Z.B Kunene Secondary School in Kanyamazane near Mbombela in Mpumalanga as part of World Read Aloud Day.
The campaign is aimed at inspiring learners to read and write.
Every year on the 1st of February, people around the globe celebrate World Read Aloud Day by reading aloud and sharing stories to encourage literacy. However, lack of reading materials remains a major challenge for some schools in the country.
This is why the Department of Arts and Culture has embarked on an initiative to assist some schools with books to grow the culture of reading. One of the schools that have received books, is the Z.B Kunene Secondary School in Kanyamazane. Some of the learners expressed their excitement and also promised that they will read aloud every day.
On World Read Aloud Day, govt calls on partners and stakeholders to engage in developing & maintaining a reading culture in our nation. We encourage parents to read to their children & make books accessible as this will improve literacy levels and reading capabilities
#WRAD2019 pic.twitter.com/eWC6KdHecF— South African Government (@GovernmentZA) February 1, 2019
Department of Arts and Culture’s Director General, Vusi Mkhize, says they want to distribute more than 10 000 books to different schools in previously disadvantaged areas. Mkhize says they will be doing this as part of their Go Back to School Imbizo and Flag Hoisting Campaign.
“The programme is going to move to other provinces with a view that we also distribute the same. So that all our learners can be educated about their identity and connects them to being South African. We are hoping that we will do at least a minimum of three schools per province, that will take you to about 27 school and if we have a minimum of about one thousand books you can see that it will be a number of books. But we are looking at about 10 thousand or so books that will be distributed.”
Mpumalanga’s Arts and Culture MEC, Thandi Shongwe, has urged parents to also encourage their children to read aloud at home.
“We want it to instill to the learners that they must read. They must not just read their books, but they must go beyond that; read newspapers, magazines. Wherever they are they must take a book and read because we are lagging behind as blacks especially in rural areas.”
The Department of Arts and Culture also informed the learners about the importance of South African history and the flags of African Union countries.
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