Read with Me starts a new year in Kouhdasht

The second year of Read with Me activities in Kouhdasht was started by implementing two-day workshops on 14 -15 October 2015. In these workshops which were held by the request of education department of Kouhdasht town, Lorestan province, totally 42 teachers, managers and moderators from four elementary schools (29 women and 13 men) were trained.

On these two days, workshops about knowing the children’s literature, knowing quality books, story elements, reading aloud and book related arts (dramatic arts) were held theoritically and practically by RWM experts.
At the begining the trainees got to know Children’s Book Council as the oldest non-governmental institution of children’s literature, the Institute for Research on the History of Children’s Literature as the performer of the Read with Me project and the main axis of this program. In a part of these workshops the teachers learned about the importance and role of picture in picture books and they also learned how to share picture books with children by working on literature elements in some picture books. Reading aloud and its methods in theory and practice and reading aloud of one of the project’s selected books was the other part of the workshop which was considered well by teachers.

In art workshop (dramatic arts) different kinds of puppets and the method of making them was explained and along with reading aloud of some parts of the book “Rosie’s walk” which was selected for the play, the methods of making the scene of the book, method of making hand puppets from the book characters and playing the puppets were taught to teachers practically and theorically which was interesting for teachers.

RWM experts also explained the necessity of documentation, writing reports, gathering children’s identification information and the importance of taking pictures and films in RWM project and how to do these.

In the gap between the workshps it was tried to change the mood and increase the concentration by relaxation and doing some exercises.

At the end the books of Read with Me project was distributed among the teachers to be shared with children in classes. This workshop had very positive feedbacks and most of the teachers, even the ones who had started the workshops indifferently, left the wokshops satisfied and content. Finally everyone admitted the benefits of the workshops.