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CASE STUDY: More Effective Schools

Group Village Headman Embraces the Reading Campaign

Summary of the Discussion at the Training Center

Teaching children to read is perceived as the responsibility of the teacher, who has been trained to teach the children. Parents and guardians generally make very little effort to monitor or enhance their children's reading skills. Many believe they cannot help their children to improve their reading ability. Pupils share this sentiment - if they fail to read at school, they cannot learn at home. Fortunately, the introduction of reading campaign is changing the attitude of some people in the communities.

The Group Village Headman in the Phalombe District, welcomed the introduction of the reading campaign in the schools. In his statement of accepting the campaign at the end of the training, he pointed out several issues.

"Our children are not able to read as it was the case in the past. It is the teacher's duty to teach a child to read, but it is the duty of everyone to help a child to continue reading at home and develop a reading habit. We have learnt that a child does not learn to read by reading from the books alone, but from different surfaces. Every parent has to make sure that his or her child has brought a reading material home and has been assisted to read. The reading campaign will assist parents and teachers to work together to monitor their children's education, especially in reading." - Group Village Headman for Mwanga

The Group Village Headman called on all participants to inform others the importance of this campaign and to work together for the improvement of their children's education. He pledged his total support in the mobilization of the community to produce reading materials and to persuade parents to follow up on their children's reading at home.

See more Reading Campaign photos