CDG Group’s Step Forward with “The Wisdom of Sharing” to support The BMA’s “World Book Capital” project
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For over these 45 years, the CDG Group has always been strongly committed to strengthening the welfare of the Thai society in terms of education. Considering the importance of education, the company has continued to foster knowledge for students through “The Wisdom of Sharing” project alongside to the business. With this project, the company intends to promote the keenness to learn among our citizens in remote regions of Thailand; the “Second hand computers for faraway children” project that we have continuously carried out serves as a perfect example of our efforts to encourage learning. The company firmly believes that in order for the country to develop sustainably in the future, the foundations of education must first be laid for our citizens.
By virtue of the government’s policy to stir up passion for reading among the Thai population, April the 2nd has now been appointed as the yearly national reading day. Furthermore, the government has also established the years 2009-2013 as the reading period in hopes of ameliorating the Thai reading statistics.
The Thai Population Reading Statistics (6 years and older)
Categories Most Read
1. Newspaper 71%
2. Fiction/Comics 38.8%
3. Magazine 35.4%
Age Distribution
1. Children 81.5%
2. Adolescents 78.6%
3. Working age 64.3%
4. Elderly 39.3%
Gender
1. Male 67.5%
2. Female 65.1%
Children Population
1. Highest reading statistics- children from Bangkok 45.3%
2. Lowest reading statistics- children from Eastern Thailand 31.3%
As result of all efforts to encourage reading in Bangkok, UNESCO has recently nominated Bangkok as the “Bangkok World Book Capital 2013” this April 23, 2013. Aside from this, several members have continuously hosted activities under the concept of “Read for Life” in order to inspire more people to read. One of the events that the CDG group has organized is known as “Baeng-Pun-Pun-Yah” (sharing of knowledge); this project aims to support the government’s policy to encourage the love of reading through sharing knowledge to the children.One of the outstanding features that this project possesses is its continuity. Since CDG Group’s team members periodically visit the school for discussions with the teachers, this regularly informs team members of the school’s current issues. With this in mind, members carefully contemplate on this problem in order to make the most suitable adjustments to the activities for the school.
CDG Group’s first model began with the Wat Klong Poom School, where it started with:
– Identifying the main issue based on the facts gathered about the school. The central issue that the school faced was the school’s lack of books in the library; this of course affected the students’ reading habits, as it did not seem to encourage reading at all.
– Helping the school in the long run by starting with improvements in the school’s library.
– Filling the school’s bookshelves with educative books gathered from various places.
– Sharing knowledge on organizing library systems to teachers, so that they may further develop the library.
– Organizing a contest for adolescents who love to read, and another drawing contest under the theme “My dream library” for the “Love reading, Love books” event. As prizes to these contests, contestants will receive an informative field trip to KidZania Bangkok, which is a replica of the career world. Through this field trip, students will hopefully be able to search for their dream career in the future, and will also feel more inspired to learn.
Recently, the project “Baeng-Pun-Pun-Yah” has organized events for its third school known as the Wat Pariwas School in August 2, 2013; this school’s problem is no different from the problems in Wat Klong Poom School, as they both possess very few books in the library. Besides the issues with the lack of books, the books in their library are also mostly geared towards adults, and the library is so cramped that it has affected the student’s reading habits. Furthermore, the borrowing and returning system in the library is slow and may not be updated with new information.
From all the information stated, this has incited the CDG Group’s team members’ motivation to help make the children’s dreams come through by searching for educative books to offer to the school, and by organizing activities under the AEC’s movement, “Love reading Love books”. One of the activities for the fifth “Baeng-Pun-Pun-yah” project aimed to develop the student’s reading habits by introducing them with the English term of their dream career. During this activity, the CDG Group’s team brought in a fluent English speaker to teach the students to properly pronounce the terms in English, and also asked the students to draw a picture of their ideal occupation in the future. Aside from those activities, the students were also asked to promise to read 15 books within a 3 months period with the help of a reading loyalty card to further promote Bangkok’s policy.
“The CDG Group is ready to move forward as a team to motivate the children of Thailand to become more intent on reading by at least 10-15 more books/people/years. As of now, there are more than 1,500 students who have benefited from this project; this reflects the company’s truest intentions to encourage a stronger reading habit in Thai society that will persist for years to come” as said by Mr. Nart Liuchareon, CEO of CDG Group.
