 |
INSTITUTE
FOR THE STUDY
OF HUMAN
KNOWLEDGE
|
 |
|
|
| 
Literacy programs choose Hoopoe Books to help children build language and reading skills
Now in its twelveth year, our Hoopoe Books Share Literacy Program has donated over 250,000 books nationwide. We ensure that every child who participates in our programs receives at least one book to take home and keep. WHY ARE BOOKS IN THE HOME IMPORTANT?
Being read to as a child and having books in the home are the two most important indicators of future academic success. Yet families who live at or below the federal poverty level cannot afford to buy books and seldom have books in the home. Children exposed to books and reading during preschool
years enter kindergarten with the ability to understand 20,000 words,
versus 3,000 words for those children who do not have this exposure. Unfortunately, studies also show that if a child’s reading and vocabulary level is not in the higher range it is difficult for them ever to catch up. The link between academic failure and delinquency, violence and crime is welded to reading failure. There is growing recognition among educators that the Teaching-Stories collected and written for children by Idries Shah and published by ISHK's Hoopoe Books are especially effective in the development of reading, language, and thinking skills in children of all ages. Originating from the rich storytelling traditions of Afghanistan, Central Asia, and the Middle East, these teaching tales were designed to teach children about themselves and their world. They activate analogical and critical thinking skills, foster social-emotional growth, intuition and perception. ISHK has a long list of requests for help from early childhood agencies and schools serving low-income children and their families who have all been severely hurt by the current economy. More often than not, there are not enough books and too little support for teachers: teaching resources and professional development training. Reading, comprehension and thinking skills are the specific skills these children need most to succeed in school and move beyond a life of poverty. With your support we can help them do this. Share Literacy relies on donations and grants to cover its direct expenses: production and printing of materials and professional development costs. To make a donation, please click here. DONATIONS FROM INDIVIDUALS FOR THE CURRENT YEAR WILL BE MATCHED BY A GRANT FROM A PRIVATE FOUNDATION, WHO WILL DOUBLE YOUR GIFT! ISHK-Hoopoe Books for Afghanistan Program
A young girl at an orphanage in Kabul reading The Lion Who Saw Himself in the Water by Idries Shah in a bilingual Dari-Pashto edition. The book was distributed in 2009 by KOR for Hoopoe Books. The Teaching-Stories published by Hoopoe Books are part of Afghanistan’s rich oral tradition, told there by campfire and candlelight for more than 1,000 years. Selected and written especially for children by the Afghan author and savant, Idries Shah, these universal tales have been commended by Western educators for their ability to foster thinking skills and perception. Now the ISHK Hoopoe Books for Afghanistan program will ensure that these traditional tales return home in book form as part of an effort to improve Afghan literacy rates. We provide bilingual Dari-Pashto, and English-only paperbacks, audio readings of them, and classroom Teacher Guides, to schools, orphanages and libraries throughout Afghanistan. For more information on this program, visit www.booksforafghanistan.org
ISHK-Hoopoe Books for Pakistan Program
We now have a Hoopoe representative in Karachi to take care of printing & distribution. An initial run of 3,000 copies of “The Lion Who Saw Himself in the Water,” has been printed successfully and will soon be collected by Developments in Literacy (DIL) for their schools. Other NGOs are waiting and we would like to help them by printing 40,000 copies of each of the three press-ready titles. Please go to http://hoopoekids.com/pakistan.htm to read more about this program and make a contribution.
 Visit the Share Literacy website to get the latest NEWS: www.shareliteracy.org
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The
time from birth through age eight is the most critical for children
in acquiring the “building blocks” of literacy, yet an alarming
number of children today are entering school without the foundation
they need to succeed. 
Your
help is desperately needed. ISHK-Hoopoe Books is now
collaborating with DIL (Developments in Literacy) to donate these beautiful
children’s books by Idries Shah to the children they serve. DIL
runs 150 schools serving approximately 15,000 children, especially girls,
in underdeveloped regions in Pakistan.