Kids Read is a literacy project developed by the British Council and funded by HSBC Bank. The project has been implemented in Ha Noi since March in 2016. The project aims to encourage reading both in the classroom and at home through a core teacher training initiative incorporating a variety of accompanying wrap-around activities.
To encourage students to read books, the project has been organising Reading Challenges and Reading Competitions for students, especially reading English stories from the collection of books which were brought by the Kids Read project for school libraries in the six participating schools. Through these activities, students not only learn good messages from stories but also improve language skills and increase the habit and passion of reading.
During each Reading Challenge, each participating school will select between three and five classes to participate in reading activities. Students are encouraged to choose and read four books from the book collection funded by the project for a period of 5 to 6 weeks. Students write a summary of the stories which they’ve read on the Reading Passport and submit it to the teacher. Teachers read and assessed their student’s reading passports. Then they held a lucky draw for students.
Time constraint is a challenge for teachers and students in running the project activities. There are many extra-curricular activities for students and teachers during the academic year both for English and other subjects. However the children love the project. They enjoy reading and enthusiastically participate in the reading activities.
"Fantastic!!!. I love reading because books are very interesting. When I read books I feel relax. Some books make me laugh because they are so funny. I love books and I want people in the world will read more books to have for more knowledge" – said Truong Bao Han, a grade 4 student from Ngoc Lam school.
Mrs. Thanh Mai, an English teacher from Hoang Dieu Primary School said: At the first place, it was not very easy because we had to choose appropriate and interesting stories to introduce to students. But our teachers found it interesting and useful, especially for the students because it will attract them to read more and focus on the lesson in class.
So far the project has attracted more than three thousand students from six schools participating in four reading challenges and more than a million and a half students participating in two student’s competitions.