‘Promote reading culture among children’
A former Director-General of the Ghana Education Service (GES), Mr Charles Yaw Aheto-Tsegah, has urged Ghanaians to promote the culture of reading among children in order to lay a solid foundation for the attainment of quality education.
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He said information was now being described as one of the factors of production, if not the most important, and Ghana could not acquire information or knowledge without reading.
Mr Aheto-Tsegah told Daily Graphic in an interview after a book launch in Accra last Monday that one could not talk of development without mentioning libraries.
“Libraries are information-oriented institutions which collect, organise, store and disseminate information to meet the needs of their users. We also think that parents must purchase more books for their children to promote the reading culture among children in the country,” he said.
Method of learning
The book, ‘’Naa Challenger Series’’, is a crossword puzzle book, written by Mrs Elfrida N.A. Adablah, to introduce learners in primary, junior and senior high schools to the practice and solution to crossword puzzles, as an innovative, creative and fun means of learning and using vocabulary.
Mrs Adablah said her motivation to write the book was derived from the love she had for words.
“So, I have been feeding on this food in this light for many years as an avid reader, as well as a crossword fan. I enjoyed the experience so much that I decided to write one myself. But to confess, I started this book more than 15 years ago.
“I kept going back to it periodically without much resolve until late 2013, when I was retired from my post as Head Librarian at Ghana International School then I decided to revive the project and complete it,” she said.
According to her, crossword puzzles are fun, challenging and educative, explaining that the puzzles in the book are guaranteed to provide essential stimulation to an enquiring and eager mind and are undoubtedly a major step in learning to think and use language independently.
“Even though the books have been categorised into specific levels for teaching and learning purposes, the entire series can be a source of fun and discovery for everyone,” Mrs Adablah added.
She observed that getting children in the country to love words and to challenge themselves into becoming lifelong learners had become the crusade by herself and her team over the years.
“We must work to change the habit of our young people idling and engaging in unprofitable pastimes as they watch unedifying television programmes or engage in questionable activity on their phones,” she said.