On a hot, dry February day, in a heat that would normally make the most attentive     student lethargic, a Grade 4 class is rapt. Seated cross-legged on the floor, their  mouths agape, eyes bright and never wavering, they focus intently on the woman turning the pages of ‘Jack’s Tractor’ by Thomas Taylor. Throughout the story, they repeat sounds and words back at...

Stories travel – by word of mouth and in writing. Stories for children have been adapted over time from adult stories, often by translators, who have been responsible for crafting and shaping stories to suit their audiences across time and space. Think of Aesop’s Fables, told by Aesop, a slave and storyteller in Ancient Greece in the 5th century BC. Aesop’s Fables moved across continents for centuries,...

One could have easily mistaken the adult reading workshop for a pre-school class as grown men and women jumped up and down, sang and performed theatrics – all in the name of promoting literacy. The Nal’ibali regional training workshop hit the Grahamstown area at the weekend as part of a national drive to get children and adults reading for enjoyment in a bid to inspire...

One of my favourite storybook characters as a child was Mrs Tiggywinkle from The Tale of Mrs Tiggywinkle by Beatrix Potter. She was a hedgehog who miraculously reinvented herself daily – without ever compromising her true identity – into an industrious entrepreneur who ran a laundry service! There she was bustling across the rolling green hills of the English countryside, a world that for me...