Little Libraries donation targets literacy boost in St Andrew

ADacosta Edwards Primary School in St Andrew has received a Little Library aimed at giving students greater access to books and encouraging a stronger reading culture.

The donation was made on Friday by Prince Godwill D. Fomusoh, founder and president of the Prince Godwill D. Fomusoh Foundation (PGDFF), as part of the Caribbean branch’s free literacy library programme, which has been carried out in Barbados for the past three years in collaboration with the Massy Foundation and the Ministry of Education Transformation.

Acting Principal Gregston Vaughan welcomed the donation, describing it as a timely resource ahead of the new school term.

“I’m very thankful. I think it’s very timely because not only is the school term soon about to start, but because of the programmes that we have planned for this term, especially in the early childhood department, it will be a very useful resource for the school,” he said.

Fomusoh said the ministry has helped to identify schools in need of libraries, while explaining that the initiative was driven by concerns about children spending increasing amounts of time on their phones instead of reading.

“It’s necessary because we are trying to promote literacy, not only in the islands but all over the world, because we found out that a lot of children are being stuck with their cell phones these days,” he said.

“So we thought about having libraries with books like you see today, where they can actually take a book and read and actually feel the power of reading.”

He said reading could help children develop their communication skills and connect more meaningfully with what they were learning.

“We believe that reading will help to foster the children and build their speaking engagement… next future,” Fomusoh said.

The Little Library at A. Dacosta Edwards also contains two books authored and signed by Fomusoh, Flying with the Prince and The Prince Fire Safety Tips.

He said the books were included to give children an opportunity to learn while reading.

“You can see Flying with the Prince, which is a little mini-book, it came out a couple of years back. And we also have The Prince Fire Safety Tips, which the children can learn basic fire and safety tips,” he said.

Fomusoh also stressed that encouraging children to read should extend beyond the classroom, with parents playing a role by modelling the behaviour at home.

“We’re also saying that adults should also leave their tablets and their cell phones and get back into the traditional reading,” he said.

“Because when adults do the reading, the children also at home, they can see, they can copy what their parents are doing at home.”

For Vaughan, the importance of the donation extends beyond simply providing students with books.

“Reading is a fundamental skill,” he said, noting that language arts involved “many strategies and methods that we apply in school for teaching and learning, which children need to adopt to apply themselves to function effectively in the real-world society that we live in.”

He added that the library would provide students with practical opportunities to develop their reading abilities.

“Among the different challenges that we have in our schools, we know that a resource like this would be helpful to give children those hands-on experiences and allow them to also experience different types of reading skills in the classroom,” Vaughan said.

He believes the resource could also benefit generations of students who pass through the school.

“I think that this will go a long way in helping them to be competent citizens of our country, helping them to be able to be problem solvers and critical thinkers, and to be able to… set examples for younger children who come after them,” he said.

The foundation also presented a Little Library to Selah Primary School on Friday following the presentation at A. Dacosta Edwards Primary.

(LE)