Parents learning too in Literacy Week

By Deidre Fanene 25 August 2016, 12:00AM

“Explore through Words and Numbers” is the theme for this year’s third annual Literacy Week.

Yesterday the programme was held at Samoa College as the host school with primary schools from the Vaimauga district.

Hosted by the Ministry of Education, Sports and Culture, the winners of each zone will represent their zones and schools at the national level during the National Week for Literacy and Numeracy next month.

At Samoa College yesterday, parents and teachers were seen supporting the children and learning that reading and Maths can be taught through fun activities.

Some students were given passages to see how well they could read n Samoan while others were given the chance to come up with a character from one of their favourite books.

Students of Year 1 and 2 dressed up as different book characters

One of the students was Alan from Vailele Primary School.

He represented his school by dressing up as Kiri from the book called “A Quilt for Kiri” by Don Long with pictures by Judith Kunzlé.

Alan said he chose this character because Kiri helped his mother quilt a cover for the bed. “I like this book because it demonstrates Kiri helping his mother quilt his grandmother’s cover that was sent to him,” said Alan. A mother of one of the students, Foketi Matini said that she is very happy to see her kids enjoy themselves .

“I am a mother of four; three are in schools and I can honestly say that reading is not my kids’ thing at home,” she said.

“When I tell them to read, it’s like I’m telling them that they are not having any lunch. But looking at them enjoying this programme, I now have some ideas of how to make reading fun for them.

“I can start by telling them to pick their favourite character and dress up like them and then they can learn that reading is fun.”

She also said that for one of her children, his worst subject is maths.

“I am speaking the truth that this is one of the subjects that my children, especially my second child, dislikes,” she said.

“He says it’s hard and that he cannot understand anything even when the teacher explains to him so many times.

“He is very slow when it comes to numbers and I always try to find ways to make it easier for him but it just doesn’t get through to him. I hope this programme will give me ideas of how to help my children.

“They need to know that one of the most important subjects is maths. So hopefully my children can learn from this and it will make my job easier as a teacher and a mother.” Last week Savaii schools were the first to take part in this year’s programme focusing not only on reading, but also on numbers. This week, the programme shifted to Falevao Primary School and then on the second day it carried on to primary schools from Falealili, Safata and Lefaga.

By Deidre Fanene 25 August 2016, 12:00AM
Samoa Observer

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