Young Library Assistant Shares His Experiences

The Read with Me program encourages young volunteers to take responsibility for part of the duties in libraries. The cooperation of children in a library that is initially their own, will influence them greatly. Aside from giving them the opportunity to make decisions and cooperate, they can enhance their social skills and responsibility. To our experience, children who have tasted the joy of reading and reading aloud sessions, are the best promoters themselves.

Mokhtar, is a young member of Javanroud Child-centered Library. He has volunteered since this September to become a library assistant.

“I chose to be a library assistant because I was interested. I wanted to get away from the obligatory reading atmosphere at home and choose the books myself… I enjoyed reading aloud to children. I wanted to show that I have certain skills like my siblings… I found being a librarian to be a great opportunity to prove myself to my father. The books I read gradually added to my knowledge. I met more children and got to know their behaviors better…”, he says regarding his motivations.

Mokhtar has been working hard to deal with his new responsibilities. He follows the activities in the library with great care. He attentively observes the methods of librarians, practices reading aloud, and tries to communicate better with children of different age-groups. Exactly like a librarian! He sometimes talks about the difficulties of his job: “Among all the children I’ve worked with, 7-9 year-old boys were the most difficult. I couldn’t control them!”

Mokhtar’s experience shows that a child-centered library is a place to respect and practice children’s rights. Decision-making and cooperation are among children’s rights. Therefore, it’s necessary to provide young ones with the opportunity of actively cooperating in the society. Read with Me strongly believes that child-centered libraries are where passivity can turn into activeness.

Javanroud Child-centered Library is one of the libraries that was established after the 2017 earthquake hit Kermanshah province. With its creative librarians, this library has succeeded to attract children.