The Young Educators Foundation(YEF), a non-governmental organization, has called on the Ghana Education Service (GES) to engage local authors of international repute to produce storybooks.
The Country Director of YEF, Madam Eugenia Tachie-Menson indicated that by so doing, the authors would be gainfully employed while educating the Ghanaian child using the Ghanaian culture.
Madam Tachie-Menson made the appeal at the launch of the 8th Edition of The Spelling Bee (TSB) competition at the Jack and Jill School, at Roman Ridge in Accra, on Saturday.
The title sponsor of the programme is Indomie Instant Noodles in collaboration with other partners; Type Company Limited, Rufus Green Parks, PAS of US Embassy-Accra, Peace Corps Volunteers-Ghana, Multichoice Ghana, New Crystal Health Services, Newmont Ahafo Development Fund, E-toys and More, Muscatella, Voltic and the GES.
Madam Tachie-Menson lauded GES for introducing ‘Reading Hour’ in the 2014/15 academic year to help stem the bad reading habits of the children.
“This is welcome news for us at The Spelling Bee because we are avid proponents of reading and believe a good speller is usually a good reader and vice-versa”.
She also expressed hope that the initiative will be well executed “It is our sincere hope that, this well-intentioned policy of the GES will be executed in a manner that will justify its introduction.”
The Country Director was also hopeful that, the GES would also introduce a ‘Spelling Hour‘in no time.
According to her, the correlation between spelling and reading is very strong and depended on a common denominator of proficiency with language.
Miss. Tachie-Menson said though the Young Educators Foundation is determined to ensure that no child is left out in their educational programme, some of their sponsors are cutting back or totally withdrawing their funding due to economic challenges. This development she said would directly affect the public schools in the regions outside Accra.
Madam Josephine Kuffour, a retired educationist of GES, who launched the 2014/15 8th Edition of The Spelling Bee, described the programme as laudable and appealed to government to support the Young Educators Foundation to reach out to all schools in the country.
By: Magdalene Larnyoh/citifmonline.com/Ghana