'Pusthaka Nestham' to revive art of reading among students

• Each government school will get a set of 50 storybooks and each student will get an opportunity to read five to six storybooks at home and return them after reading

• Students from Classes III to VIII in 36,000 schools across the State will benefit out of the programme

• The idea is to reduce the screen time and strengthen the book reading culture, explains T V S Ramesh, academic coordinator of State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT)

• In addition, the Education Dept is all set to launch 'Bala Sahithyam' to enhance the literary skills and creative thinking among students

Visakhapatnam: In the digital era, reading for pleasure has become a thing of the past, especially among the children.

When classrooms gave way to virtual classes in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, not many look forward to picking up a book and investing in reading.

In a bid to encourage students to revive the art of reading for fun, the Department of School Education with the support of Samagra Shiksha has launched the 'Pusthaka Nestham' programme.

In connection with this, fairy tales, Panchatantra, 'Kaasi Majili Kathalu' and inspiring autobiographies have been sent to the schools to be shared with the students. "The idea is to reduce the screen time and strengthen the book reading culture. Apart from Telugu storybooks, bilingual storybooks in Telugu and English have been supplied to the school managements," explains T V S Ramesh, academic coordinator of State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT), Andhra Pradesh.

Each government school will get a set of 50 storybooks and a student will get an opportunity to read five to six storybooks at home and return them after reading. Students from Classes III to VIII in 36,000 schools across the State will benefit out of the programme.

In addition to this, the department is all set to launch 'Bala Sahithyam' to enhance the literary skills and creative thinking among students. District-wise committees were formed for the endeavour, comprising poets. "As per the government guidelines, the committee members will chart out a strategy to develop district-specific content for Bala Sahithyam. Besides moral stories and folk songs, the importance of historical places and famous personalities born in the district will be highlighted," elaborates Ramesh.

The content for Bala Sahithyam will be developed in three levels – Classes I to V (level 1), Classes VI to VIII (level 2) and IX and to X (level 3). In future, Classes XI and XII will also be included in the third level, the education department officials say.

Currently, content is getting readied in both English and Telugu and it is likely to get completed in three months. "Another interesting feature of Bala Sahithyam is that children can also write stories based on the literature themes. The best ones will be printed along with the content. This will certainly broaden the imagination of the students and improve their vocabulary," adds Ramesh.

Once the content is readied, a book will be printed and distributed to the students.