On the International Literacy Day, 8 September, this year for the first time a project National Month of Joint Reading came to life in Slovenia, which lasted until the end of the Week of the Child, 8 October 2018.
The all-Slovenian campaign for promotion and awareness-raising about the importance of reading, reading literacy and reading culture in Slovenia and across the Slovenian border is a joint initiative of the Slovenian Reading Association, the Reading Badge of Slovenia Association, Slovenian Association of Friends of Youth, Slovenian Writers Association, Maribor Library, Kranj City Library, Ljubljana City Library, the Slovenian IBBY Section, the Slovenian Public Libraries Association and Slovenian Library Association. With an honorary patronage of the President Borut Pahor and the Slovenian National Commission for UNESCO, it was carried out in collaboration with the MESS and SIAE.
A distinctive image of the project was given by artistic creations on the topic of joint reading by the winners of the Slovenian Biennial of Illustration: Suzana Bricelj, Zvonko Čoh, Jelka Godec Schmidt, Marjan Manček, Matija Medved, Andreja Peklar, Peter Škerl and Ana Zavadlav, calling to the curious from various promotional materials.
This year’s event was attended by 175 providers from Slovenia, Slovenians living in the neighbouring countries and from abroad. Slovenian reading culture and the importance of reading literacy both came to life through more than 500 different events aimed at children and adolescents, families, adults, professional workers etc., and they were also published and presented on the official project website, NMSB schedule 2018.
However, the NMSB did not only encourage readers to read since the project also represents an important building block in establishing a national network, which, on the basis of the proposal of the National Strategy for the Development of Reading Literacy with a vision of raising the reading culture and reading literacy of all inhabitants in Slovenia, with Slovenians living in the neighbouring countries and Slovenians around the world, has already been in the works in 2018.
At the end of the campaign we would like to endorse its continuation within the framework of the national campaign “Joint Reading” in the organisation of the Reading Badge of Slovenia Association – the Slovenian Association of Friends of Youth with co-financing of the Slovenian Book Agency.
Diana Volčjak (diana.volcjak@acs.si), SIAE
