STUDENTS URGED TO SPEND TIME READING BOOKS (PAGE 11)

THE Northern Regional Director of Education, Mr John Hobenu, has expressed concern about what he described as the alarming rate at which some students and pupils spend time on modern electronic gadgets such as the computer, the Internet and mobile phones.
He said by so doing, most children neglected to read books to enrich their vocabulary in the English language, adding that “they rarely make conscious efforts to read books which accounts for their abysmal performance in examinations.”
Mr Hobenu stated this at the inauguration of a book fair for the region in Tamale on Wednesday. The fair, among other objectives, was aimed at bringing together producers and end-users of books for interaction among themselves as well as providing a platform for publishers to showcase their books (past and current) for the benefit of students and pupils.
The fair was on the theme “The Child Has the Right to Read” and was jointly organised by the Ghana Book Development Council (GBDC), the Ghana Education Service (GES), the Ghana Book Publishers Association (GBPA) and the Children’s Literature Foundation (CLIF).
The regional director emphasised that “students must understand that they can only enjoy the fullest benefits of this technological development if much time is devoted to books at the libraries which will eventually push them to greater academic heights.”
According to Mr Hobenu, the falling standards of languages (both local and official) is a major source of worry to educationists.
“The problem is even worse for English language; that is why a lot of efforts are being made to improve upon readership in our schools and indeed this book fair is one of the solutions to this embarrassing situation”, he pointed out.
Mr Hobenu acknowledged that the poor performance of pupils and students respectively in the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) and the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) over the years was quite worrying and that concerted efforts were needed to reverse the trend.
“The reasons for the abysmal performance in the BECE and WASSCE obviously include lack of understanding of examination questions. This is because our children are not exposed to library facilities, hence have very limited store of vocabulary”, he lamented.
The Executive Director of the GBDC, Professor Samuel Boateng, said the fair was geared towards getting pupils and students, as well as teachers and parents to get to know first hand, the group of people behind the books published.
“Most importantly, the book fair is premised on the grounds that students, pupils, parents, philanthropists and other members of our society will take advantage of the fair to buy books at reduced prices”, he stated.
The Regional Minister, Alhaji Mustapha Ali Idris, for his part, urged the youth to spend much of their time reading instead of watching films and visiting nightclubs.
The minister also entreated parents, teachers and educationists to help inculcate the habit of reading in children to broaden their knowledge and enrich their vocabulary in the English language.