The importance of reading

Author: Adrienne Rivera

Reading is an essential part of every subject taught in High School. At ACS, we, the English department, wish that every child fosters a love for reading throughout their high school career. We also believe that constant reminders to read for pleasure and modelling the love of reading, like sharing which books we are reading at present is the best way to encourage reading.

We have compiled a suggested reading list of some of the books that are housed in our Saint Thomas More Library. A key to assist with genre and gradings is found after each title to indicate the target age group and level of difficulty. In this way, your daughter will be able to select a book in a much easier way. Library prefects and teachers are also privy to this list, and use it to access and/or assist students with choosing books to read.

Recently, at a conference I attended, Hannes Barnard of Penguin Random House publishing explained that Young Adults/ Adolescents (YA) book sales were on the rise. This, he explained, was primarily due to the phenomenon of BookTok, an online community on the TikTok social media platform for book lovers to share and discover books and reading content. Obviously, we are delighted with this new trend but we were then alerted by Ms Catherine Jarvis, author of The Swim Team, when she presented her writing process at our annual author talk held at ACS, that some BookTok books are not appropriate for very young readers i.e. ages 12-14. We therefore, encourage parents and teachers to advise and prepare our young readers to select books that are age appropriate. English teachers are armed with a list of books compiled under ‘spicy’ and ‘not spicy’ columns to assist our readers further. Our teachers update this list regularly. Fortunately, Exclusive Books, publishers and friends of Assumption also assist us in this regard.

We understand that reading has morphed over the years, from hard copies to eBooks and audio-books. It is easy to transport and accessible anywhere, after all. Although, we are excited that the City of Johannesburg Library has recently re-opened; we ask each student to borrow books from the City of Johannesburg Library’s electronic library. This e-library mushroomed during the covid years and it is astounding the number of books, magazines and newspapers that are available on this app! Simply download the Libby Application to your tablet/ iPad or even cell phone. Libby is a mobile app that supports users in accessing library eBooks. The app uses a user's library card number to connect to the user's library account and check out eBooks. You will require a library card number. The CoJ Library website is easy to navigate and once you have been issued a library card, you can enjoy various magazines, novels and newspapers online.

https://cojlibrary.overdrive.com

Further to inculcating the love of reading, we bring the entire campus i.e. Baby Steps 2 Assumption (ECD centre), the Primary School and the High Schools together for a celebration of reading day. On the Thursday before our mid-term break, in October, we combine World Book & Copyright Day, the Book Aid initiative and a world-wide phenomenon DEAR Day to celebrate reading. The girls may come to school dressed as their favourite book character on this day, and an award will be presented for the best dressed character. My favourite part of the day is when everyone at school drops everything that they are doing and silently reads a novel of their choice.

According to many scholars of language acquisition, reading goes together with writing hence we, the English Department, have various ways where your child may demonstrate her reading/writing skills:

1. Poetry writing

ZAPP (The South African Poetry Project) presents a workshop in July on poetry writing. Slam poetry is very popular with young adults, and they are encouraged to write their own poems and record them to be viewed online. The ZAPP team selects the best performed poems and awards them a prize. The best poetry writers have an opportunity of showcasing their poetry at the annual ZAPP Fest and we are so proud that a few of our students’ work may be accepted for publication in their anthology.

Over and above the ZAPP experience, we encourage students to send their poetry to the SACEE English Alive series, where our English teachers draw many of their poems from which to teach in the school year. Our staff are also encouraged to write poetry, two of our teachers are published poets!

2. Creative writing

Each year, your daughter will enter the ACS Creative Writing Essay Competition. Winners are awarded Exclusive Books vouchers at our prestigious prize-giving evening. We have adopted a new method of process writing using AI to assist with grammar and development of ideas. The students write 2-3 drafts of their essays and we are proud of their excellent level of creativity and language skills.

Throughout the year, the English teachers will advertise writing competitions. We particularly enjoy the Kingsmead Young Writers Essay Competition and the SACEE Creative Writing Competitions. We encourage the girls to enter these competitions, especially if they feel passionate about the theme.

On Fridays, the Grades 8 and 9 students have a reading lesson. In this lesson, we may complete several activities encapsulating ‘reading’. We might read a book in silence (every two weeks), we may complete a mission on Literacy Planet (a digital literacy management platform that helps students to improve their English literacy online through fun, engaging and curriculum-aligned exercises) (every two weeks) or we conduct a debate/ panel discussion on a trending global issue (once a term). In these lessons, students are to prepare beforehand for their panel discussions/ debates and develop critical thinking skills as well as keeping up with current affairs. We have named these lessons, our Ulwazi sessions. We love to hold our Ulwazi sessions in the library and/or do our reading and Literacy Planet outdoors in our school gardens - weather permitting of course. The Grades 10, 11 and 12 students enjoy adhoc book club meetings and current affairs discussions before or after English lessons to ensure our students are up-to-date with the latest news and/or novels.

I am very proud of the fact that we have a strong culture of reading at ACS. So much so, that our students and teachers often feel FOMO if they are not sharing their current reading with their peers. Moreover, the proof is in the pudding when so many of our students excel in English Home Language, Afrikaans and isiZulu First Additional Languages in their final IEB examinations.

I firmly agree with Plato that "Books give a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything". And so, we encourage our parents to read and we urge them to remind their daughters of the importance and value of reading.

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