lets bring back the reading culture in Ghana #Make Reading Cool Again

my story.

Let’s bring back the reading culture in Ghana with the slogan #Make Reading Cool Again. Reading has been an essential part of my childhood and life, thanks to my parents and grandmother’s love for books. As a child, I listened to audiobooks each night before bed and wrote long summaries after reading. Although it didn’t make me popular among the girls, I wanted to impress. However, it fostered a lifelong love for books that has only grown stronger over time.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, I found solace in reading, finishing my work quickly and dedicating much of my time to reading. I read a wide range of genres, from economics, finance, physics, and technology to black authors, books on fungi, and romance, thanks to my friends and book club, Rona Reads.

When I visited improvised schools in Ghana, I was dismayed to find that many students lacked a significant reading habit and appreciation, especially those from working-class backgrounds. I conducted extensive research and discovered that the impoverished in Ghana have a complex relationship with books, resulting in a society that does not value reading beyond acquiring information for specific purposes like passing exams.

I believe that establishing new initiatives and encouraging existing efforts among Ghanaian school children is extremely important, especially given Ghana’s particular economic situation. Ghana is currently one of the fastest-growing emerging economies in the world, and an educated and informed public is essential for high leverage. In the past, many of Ghana’s revolutionary intellectuals and writers were well-read, both in Ghanaian and foreign literature, and continued to read beyond their schooling and profession requirements.

To improve the reading culture in Ghana, I suggest that Ghanaian educators learn from successful models like the tigers and Nordic systems and adopt their educational systems’ positive aspects. I propose that educators encourage self-initiated reading by allowing students to have increased access to books, introducing middle school reading programs, and encouraging parental involvement in reading.

My ultimate goal is to change the trajectory of an entire generation’s line of thinking by fostering their thirst for knowledge, making them curious citizens who can question absurdities and develop personal, sensible opinions. We must embrace alternative methods that incorporate the use of computers, especially the pedagogical power of the internet, to enhance the reading culture in the digital age. However, we cannot skip traditional reading, as it provides unique benefits to children in school and later in life. Therefore, we must both increase and encourage reading outside of school assignments to foster lifelong reading habits.