Reading skills are getting more and more important. Nevertheless, one in five young people in Austria cannot read well. In order to change this and to make children better equipped for their future, the Austrian Buchklub and Hofer have launched a reading campaign to promote language and reading skills of children and adolescents.
The Buchklub checks the quality of the children’s and youth books offered by Hofer, for example, with regard to their legibility, the interests and needs of young readers. Books that do not meet the criteria will not make it into the shelves at the Hofer stores. All books that are particularly suitable for the promotion of reading now bear the seal “Recommended by the Austrian Buchklub”. This new campaign provides the best reading material to promote already the youngest readers from the beginning.
“The goal of the cooperation between Hofer and the Buchklub is reading promotion in the sense of family literacy. Especially families who do not encourage reading are addressed, and so children can be reached who would otherwise have little or no access to reading material. The familiar supermarket is a very suitable place for this. The reading material approved by the Buchklub comprises easily readable, attractive and popular children’s books that are interesting and appealing for non-reading families,” says Gerhard Falschlehner, the managing director of the Austrian Buchklub.
In the course of the campaign „Education starts with Reading“, Hofer also supported „PHILIPP. The Reading-Award 2016“, where the Buchklub and the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education and Women’s Affairs searched for the best reading projects that promote children with reading problems.
This project is run by Buchklub der Jugend (Austria).