Kids to Get Caught Reading in Georgia this Summer
My eldest just finished 2nd grade at a Georgian school. Her teacher set her four books to read and report on before mid-September and I’m lucky that she dived right in without protest. Those who know me may remember a collection I set up for a local school in Tbilisi, whose Director had “dreamed of having a library” in the school but had yet to get round to making it a reality. Thankfully, kind donations came from far and wide and that library got filled within a month. If not- what would the students be doing this summer?
Which is why I was excited to hear that the Get Caught Reading (GCR) campaign which we’ve heard about in the West has finally been brought to Georgia, the goal of which is to motivate Georgian youth to read over the summer holidays. This summer, the program is for reading in English.
Get Caught Reading is a global campaign to promote the fun of reading books for all ages. First launched in the US in 1999 by the Association of American Publishers and now managed there by Every Child a Reader with support from the Lois Lenski Covey Foundation, Get Caught Reading encourages youth to pick up a book and talk about it… again and again. The campaign also aims to promote reading in schools and provides support to teachers and librarians.
“Because of research indicating that early language experience actually stimulates a child's brain to grow and that reading to children gives them a huge advantage when they start school, we hope to encourage people of all ages to enjoy books and magazines and to share that pleasure with the young children in their lives,” the organizers state.
The campaign has the support of well-known figures including Donald Duck, Whoopi Goldberg, Billy Graham, Jake Lloyd, Rosie O'Donnell, Dolly Parton, The Rugrats, Jane Seymour, Spider Man, Erik Weihenmayer, and Robin Williams, who have all been "caught reading" their favorite books and magazines for print ads and posters seen by millions of people across the US. In addition, more than 200 Members of Congress have been photographed "caught reading" on Capitol Hill.
Hundreds of teachers and librarians across the US have embraced the campaign, setting up "Get Caught Reading" corners, allocating a special time each day for leisure reading, and taking photos of students "caught reading" for classroom posters.
Carolyn Rice, co-founder of Get Caught Reading-Sakartvelo has lived in Georgia for 10 years, working as an English teacher.
“I love reading and come from a family of readers,” she told GEORGIA TODAY. “I have tried all along to encourage my English students to read, and two years ago I did a summer reading bingo with my class of five, where they needed to read 15 minutes a day in different locations to check off a square on the bingo card. Last summer, we added a GCR program and it was so successful with the students and parents, that another of my colleagues started it up in her school.”
In the US, May is ‘Get Caught Reading Month.’ Pictures are taken of celebrities reading and they write why they like the book they were caught with.
Reading is promoted as something fun and exciting to do- pushing youth to enjoy disappearing into the world of a book; exploring and learning along the way. It is also a popular program in Europe and there are various GCR websites with activities to do in families or small groups. The Get Caught Reading-Sakartvelo summer campaign, which you can check out on facebook, has a competitive element this year, sponsored by the Integrated School of English Language, and asks children in four age groups (covering grades 1-12) to post photos of themselves reading English books and then videos of them reviewing those books. Guidelines are provided in English and Georgian, and prizes will be given to those judged as best presented. The deadline for videos is August 31, 2018.
“This year, we’re starting small and just in English but next year we hope to expand to include Georgian, because children should get to know their own literature and get excited about it,” Carolyn tells us. “The challenge we face is that teachers are often overworked and underpaid or underappreciated and can’t think of taking on even one more thing. It may be difficult to get teachers motivated to inspire students to read. Interestingly, it’s the teachers from the regions that have shown the most excitement about this project so far. Another problem is access in villages to books- most schools don’t have libraries, and even if they live near a large town with a bookshop, finances can be an issue.”
We discuss the idea of a mobile library serving the regions and the fact that Giorgi Kekelidze, Head of the National Library, set up a project collecting books for regional libraries. Another challenge that comes up, one which I’ve noticed as a teacher myself, is the lack of adapted books for young readers on supply in Georgia. It’s easy enough to pop into a Biblus and find a classic thinned down to pre-intermediate level, but you’ll be hard pressed to find a book that a child will want to read, leaving us having to order inspiring material from amazon.
Carolyn Rice and her colleagues have set up a fundraiser (www.gofundme.com/get-caught-reading-sakartvelo) to help raise money to buy prizes for the readers and their teachers, though they are also just as happy to take donations of new or good quality children’s books (ideally in Georgian or adapted) to deliver to various village schools ahead of next year’s campaign. If you have books, or ideas to push this campaign forward, write to callie.rice@gmail.com.
“If we raise more funds than we need for this summer's campaign, we will use the funds for the next Get Caught Reading campaign, which will include Georgian books!” Carolyn says.
By Katie Ruth Davies