I came across an article in the Mail & Guardian last weekend that talked about the dire situation of teaching in SA but the article below took it further and talked about strategies to overcome it...one of the key issues being literacy and a reading culture. I especially liked this from the article (I have read one from this young reader series and can see its appeal)

"Workshops entail exploring reading, writing and storytelling strategies to turn any environment into a conducive one for literacy learning. They are about inspiring and supporting community members to start and sustain their own reading clubs, big and small."

Cover2Cover's Harmony High series continues to receive praise from pupils and teachers. The series centres on the lives of teenagers who attend Harmony High, a fictional township school.  Foundation CEO Ben Henderson said Siyanda High's principal, for example, has noticed "the children are so enthusiastic about the books that they [don't] return them to the library, [but pass] them on. They also sit in the library engrossed in reading".

The series has five titles: Broken Promises, Jealous in Jozi, Sugar Daddy, Too Young to Die and Two-Faced Friends.

Check it out: 

http://www.timeslive.co.za/thetimes/2012/11/20/ordinary-folk-lead-reading-revolution


This is the same issue we face north of the border here in Zimbabwe. Many, many people do read here in Zimbabwe but are held back from lack of books. But many more can't ,won't and don't (and in this group it is the youngsters that bother me). 

Read a book out loud and the kid gets it, make the book easy to reach and easy to get and the kid reads it for themselves. Awesome. That is why our public library still has a future :D