What a relief to write a different number. The year 2021 already sounds a lot better than the one we have just had (and will never forget). As always, there is no room for complacency, but we have had a look at the future and made plans, whatever happens. Apart from Covid, there is also the matter of ‘funding permitting’, which is always on our minds. We can do nothing about the former. We are extremely active on the looking for funding front. What we are doing is working for the children, we just have to find the investment in that belief to continue to make it happen.
THE THINGS TO REMEMBER ARE:
• The age group we work with (9-12 years-old) is where children stop reading altogether if they are not encouraged.
• Reading is the absolute key to education and a better life.
• Very little (hardly anything) is officially done for this group of children.
Plan A
Is based on the hope that we might have workshops again and be able to work directly with the children. In that case, we would begin workshops in February 2021.
Plan B
Is to continue with the distant learning we have been successfully trialing during the pandemic, where children register as CBN members and receive weekly reading and activity packs, as well as membership of our book club for home reading.
IN EITHER CASE
We will continue to develop the materials we have accumulated for the Toolbox Project, Lockdown Learning and The Happiness Project. We hope to share the reading programme more widely, partnering with online education in its many forms. We have to reach more children!
HOW CAN YOU HELP?
Expertise, knowledge, volunteerism, caring, book donation … all of these things. And funding. Every little bit helps us to bring books to children and children to books. We understand that there are so many others asking for help. We believe that the issue of children and reading is critical to the development of a generation of children with access to success.
https://www.childrensbook.co.za/network/get-involved
Note on pictures: All pictures of children without masks were taken pre-Covid 19.
