Read Beyond Borders

My first project is the reading club ‘Read Beyond Borders’. The aim of this club is to get students to read out of their school syllables and awake their love for reading. The first novel the students and I read together was Chinua Achebe’s ‘Things Fall Apart’. It is the story of the Nigerian farmer Okonkwo in the early days of colonization. Together we followed Okonkwo’s story through the struggles of his everyday life and discussed whether his love for strength and denial of empathy is the right way to conquer life. Through the similarities of actions displayed in the novel and Cameroonian culture, we often ended up discussing behavior patterns around us and I learned many things about my present environment. At the same time the students questioned their own ways of reasoning and we had many lively discussions going on about topics like polygamy, obedience, witchcraft and many more. In every meeting, the students took turns in reading out loud from the book and over the months their reading skills increased constantly. In one school we even carried out a reading competition in which the students took turns in forming the jury and competing with their reading skills. They were very eager about being the judge and giving feedback to the readers. The winner read out an inspirational text in the morning assembly in front of 800 students.  Apart from the novel I prepared different topics out of the box about which I gave the students an input and afterwards we discussed them. Over the months we talked about their perception of culture, the Millennium Development Goals and learned how to write a summary.

Crocodile Challenge’ by James Ngumy which is an adventure story about the brave Daudi and his friends who want to steal crocodile eggs from the river to find money in order to pay for one of their sisters’ hospital bill. The students were very keen on reading this book as the story is gripping and easy to understand.

The reading club was finalized by a final inter school competition in which three students from each school had to answer questions about ‘Crocodile Challenge’. The Quiz was held on 12 May 2012 at the Limbe Wildlife Center and was a great success. The boarding school Saker Baptist College scored the first prize followed by the Lura-May Bustin Memorial Christian Academy and the Kofele Luma Memorial Academy.