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The 8th September is UNESCO International World Literacy Day and to mark this event, Every Child Our Future is both celebrating the huge contribution to addressing local literacy needs made by its current volunteers and encouraging more islanders to get involved. There are a number of Jersey children who struggle to read at an early age and who benefit from one-on-one support. By become reading volunteers, volunteers can help build the skills of these children in Key Stage 1.
This year, UNESCO’s theme for International Literacy Day is ‘Literacy in a digital world’. where the overall aim is “to look at what kind of literacy skills people need to navigate increasingly digitally-mediated societies, and to explore effective literacy policies and programmes that can leverage the opportunities that the digital world provides.” Every Child, however, would like to highlight that in order to participate in the digital world, children still need to master the fundamental skills of reading, writing and comprehension.
Every Child Our Future, launched in September 2016, operates in ten non-fee paying schools, principally in town where the need has been greatest. During the course of the last academic year, the Reading Volunteer programme with support from local companies, Highlands College, secondary schools, the public sector and the wider community, read with over 300 children between ages five and 8 in schools each week.
The Jersey charity is now looking forward to working in schools for a second year, and hopes to leverage some of the worldwide focus locally. Chairman Nick Kershaw said:
“We’d like to be able to build upon the success of last year and widen our reach to the parish schools. We are recruiting now to build up additional volunteer resources to help more schools as the new term gets under way, and focus attention on the literacy needs of our young children locally.”
Volunteers are invited to the next information session is on the 21st September at Les Ormes and Every Child would like to hear from anyone who can commit to at least one hour each week in term time.
