World Book Day (23 April 2007)
18 April 2007
The Minister of Education and the provincial MECs for Education will on
Monday, 23 April 2007 celebrate World Book Day by recommitting themselves to
improving reading levels in our schools.
Minister Pandor will at 18h00 on Monday, 23 April 2007, address the launch
of the Readathon 2007, at Read Education Trust Buildings. 4 Handel Road,
Ormonde in Johannesburg. The launch will also coincide with an award ceremony
to honour the winners of the Readathon 2006 competition.
Recent research shows that many children cannot read at the appropriate
grade and age level. Two national assessments conducted by the department in
2001 and 2004, to establish literacy and numeracy levels in our primary
schools, revealed shockingly low levels of reading abilities across the
country.
In order to promote and foster a culture of reading the Department of
Education has done the following:
* provided about 10 000 schools with exciting story books in all official
languages
* initiated the Drop all and Read campaign, to introduce young learners to
reading and to encourage schools to set time aside so that learners can drop
everything and read
* supplied a number of schools with reference materials, which include
multilingual dictionaries in all languages to encore addictive
multilingualism
* increased support to teachers to help them in their teaching of reading,
using the findings of the two studies we have conducted
* developed an Early Grade Reading Assessment instrument in isiXhosa, isiZulu,
Xitsonga, Tshivenda, Sepedi and English, which will be piloted in selected
districts this year, to help teachers monitor reading progress in their own
classrooms.
On World Book Day, simple things make a difference, make time to read with
your children, visit a library, buy a book or donate some of the books your own
children have outgrown to a needy school in your neighbourhood.
For further information, please contact:
Lunga Ngqengelele
Ministerial Spokesperson
Tel: (012) 312 5538
Cell: 082 566 0446
E-mail: ngqengelele.l@doe.gov.za
Issued by: Department of Education
18 April 2007
