International Literacy Day is observed on 8th September to raise awareness about the importance of literacy for individuals, communities, and societies. The International Literacy Day is celebrated to encourage awareness towards literacy so that people from around the globe can know their social and individual rights. Literacy is considered to be a necessity for social and personal development.

Since 1967, International Literacy Day (ILD) celebrations have taken place annually around the world to remind the public of the importance of literacy as a matter of dignity and human rights, and to advance the literacy agenda towards a more literate and sustainable society.

Despite steady progress made across the world, literacy challenges persist with at least 763 million young people and adults lacking basic literacy skills in 2020. The recent COVID-19 crisis and other crisis, such as climate change and conflicts, have been exacerbating the challenges.

Rapidly changing global context took a new meaning over the past years, hampering the literacy progress and widening inequalities across world regions, countries, and populations.  In low- and middle-income countries, the share of 10-year-old children who could not read and understand a simple text with comprehension has increased from 57 per cent in 2019 to an estimated 70 per cent in 2022.

In this context, this year’s International Literacy Day is celebrated worldwide under the theme, ‘Promoting literacy for a world in transition: Building the foundation for sustainable and peaceful societies’.

ILD2023 is  an opportunity to join efforts to accelerate progress towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG4) on education and lifelong learning and to reflect on the role of literacy in building more inclusive, peaceful, just, and sustainable societies. In doing so, it will embrace the reciprocal relations between literacy and other areas of development: Literacy is central to the creation of such societies, while progress in other areas of development contributes to generating interest and motivation of people to acquire, use, and further develop their literacy and numeracy skills.

The PYP segment at The Gaudium School had planned various learning engagements to celebrate ‘ World Literacy Day’. As we understand the importance of reading and we promote the same, students of Early years enjoyed a read aloud session by Ms. Ameer, Ms. Nishita, and Ms. Zahera.  Students of Grade 1 and Grade 3 used their creativity and designed a cover page for their favourite book.  Students of Grade 2 enjoyed watching stories from different cultures and shared their reflection after the story.  Grade 4 rewrote their favourite story and shared it with their peers. Students of grade 5 wrote a letter describing their favourite story character.  All the students from Nursery to grade 5 and all the PYP teachers participated in celebrating World Literacy Day.

As truly said by,  Koichiro Matsuura – “International Literacy Day is an o ccasion to celebrate the importance of literacy to individuals, communities and societies everywhere.”