the Rainbow Reading Gardens is happy to say that we are well on our way to prepare our eight new libraries in Manggarai Barat district, East Nusa Tenggara province, in collaboration with the US-based NGO Room-to-Read. The eight new libraries will adopt the proven Room-to-Read library system. Within the past two months, we have managed to select, purchase, collect, and distribute books to enrich the colection in the new libraries.

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All in all, thanks to the support of nine Indonesian publishers, the Rainbow Reading Gardens have successfully collected 12,000 children storybook. The books will have just arrived in Labuan Bajo, the capital of Manggarai Barat district, and will be further distributed to the eight schools in four subdistricts.

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Like always, in this process we too have learned something new about Indonesia’s literacy situation. This time, During we prepare the book delivery, we realized that there are still a lot of potentials and room for growth for Indonesia’s children storybooks.

 

If we compare the children storybooks that were translated from foreign languages (especially English) to Indonesian and books that are originally written in Indonesia, we found that the original Indonesian storybooks are still somewhat limited.

 

At the same time, we found the Indonesian children storybooks that reflect the uniqueness and diversity of culture in Indonesia’s regions and cultures.

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This makes us even more optimistic that the books will bring good impact to the chidren of the Rainbow Reading Gardens.

 

Let’s increase the reading interest of the children of eastern Indonesia.