esyllabus For Africa Attributes Societal Challenges To Low Literacy Levels

The Northern Ghana Director for eSyllabus for Africa, Crispin Wura-Sey Zeikah has attributed the upsurge of cases of conflicts, cholera, malaria as well as poor sanitation and poverty in the Ghanaian society to the low literacy levels of the citizenry.

According to him, reading competence was linked-up to high priority issues such as the economy, Health, sanitation, Agriculture, Food security and peace which were pillars affecting the development of societies across the world.

Speaking in an interview with Savannahnews at a workshop organized at St. Theresa R/C Primary School in Yong-Dakpem-Yili in the Tamale Metropolis for some selected teachers, Mr. Zeikah explained that people were able to understand issues of malaria, cholera and among others when they were literally sound.

The workshop, which was a follow-up to an earlier one, aimed at enhancing and improving reading habits and literacy levels among school pupils. 

There is a general observation that reading is a major challenge for children in most basic schools across the country. 

As a result, eSyllabus for Africa, a Non-Governmental Organization operating in the African sub-region, recently organized a training programme dubbed: “Functional Literacy Improvement Programme”, for teachers to improve their skills on how to effectively inculcate and improve upon reading habits especially among basic school children through the capacity building of teachers and other necessary stakeholders in the literacy value chain. 

Beneficiary schools are supposed to develop an action plan on how to improve literacy among pupils in their schools by ensuring that their classrooms are literacy friendly.

Mr. Zeikah explained that the stability of a community depends mostly on the level of literacy of the people in that community. 

He believed that improving literacy or inculcating good reading habits among children would help reduce some of the preventable diseases such as cholera, malaria, malnutrition and their associated challenges in the country. 

The Northern Ghana Director for eSyllabus for Africa however encouraged teachers to take very key interest in the literacy programme since literacy was one of the key foundation of education.

John Bosco Moar, Head Teacher of St Theresa R/C primary school in Yong-Dakpem-Yili was optimistic that with the training programme and the action plan reading competence of the pupils will be improved. 

He commended eSyllabus for Africa for the giant step in helping to solve an age-long problem. He attributed the poor reading habits among pupils to the upbringing of the children from the homes and called for a collaborated efforts to help deal with the people.

Mr. John Bosco therefore pledged his commitment to ensure the effective and efficient implementation of the Functional Literacy Improvement Programme.