By Frederick Philander WINDHOEK An urgent request to implement a regional primary school reading project in all other parts of the country was yesterday proposed and recommended at a workshop dealing with reading problems in education. This proposal was submitted to the workshop, attended by almost 100 education experts from around Africa, by Pio Nganate, a teacher and regional councillor. The coordinator for lifelong learning in the Oshana Region, Bernadette Mukulu’s reading project, “holiday Reading Adventure”, was highly acclaimed and unanimously accepted by everyone present. “The Holiday Reading Adventure is aimed at inculcating the culture of reading and the love for books among children in the Oshana Region. The project also educates the parents to take responsibility in helping their children to read on their own and to search for information in printed literature in schools and community libraries,” said Bernadette Mukulu in her presentation to the workshop. According to her, the project was embarked upon after the realization that reading continues to affect the way people understand complex ideas. “In my view, reading constitutes one of the best ways of knowing the world. The reading event was started in 2003 among 133 schools in the region. To date, 70 schools have participated in the project that focuses on reading in Grades 1 to 7. It is envisaged that by next year all other schools would have participated,” Mukulu, a regional coordinator of Lifelong Learning in the Oshana Region, said. She emphasized the fact that the Oshana Region believes that promoting recreational reading is one of the most important services that school libraries can provide for the country’s inhabitants. “We believe that reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. People who do not read regularly and often, are in danger of not having the intellectual or emotional resources they need to deal with assignments at school or at work, the challenges of everyday life as well as giving meaning to their lives. In that sense, reading for pleasure is a survival skill,” Mukulu said. Mukulu also informed the participants that since the project’s inception all stakeholders have been actively involved, especially the parents of learners. “Parents not only get training on how to assist in the promotion of reading, they actively participate and interact in reading sessions with the learners. The parents usually share valuable societal information and perform traditional cultural rituals during the reading sessions, which normally take place in the first week of the December holidays. There is no doubt in my mind that learners want to read. We as adults must just play our part,” she said encouragingly. “In view of what we as participants have heard, what the people of the Oshana Region are doing to promote reading among learners, it is my submission that the Holiday Reading Adventure project be implemented in all other regions as a priority in education. This needs to be done through local authorities as well as the ministry of education,” proposed Nganate, a teacher at Witvlei and former mayor of Gobabis.