Pratham Books Champion : Vani Balaram

This International Literacy Day, Pratham Books has taken a 1000 steps towards a 'Reading India'

What started as a small step by Pratham Books to spread the joy of reading has become a movement. Last year Pratham Books initiated the One Day-One Story initiative on the occasion of International Literacy Day and we conducted over 250 storytelling sessions. This year we are delighted that over a 1000 sessions are happening across the length and breadth of the country.We will be sharing the stories of all our champions through our blog.

This story was sent to us by Vani Balaram. Vani Balaraman is a mother of a 4 year old naughty adorable boy, loves Indian picture books , is passionate about arts and drama and works as a software junkie in Bangalore

Storytelling session conducted on 7th September. Location : Bangalore Govt school HSR layout. Number of storytelling sessions : 2

As I wait for the school prayer to finish, I wait and glance through all pages for the last time nervously. Here I was at the Government school at HSR layout Agara , with the towering giant like Hanuman statue over seeing us. This was my first story narration in Kannada

What a great way to begin I thought. Put two and two together and I could correlate the giant Hanuman with the giant Paplu

I narrated the story with a mix of Kannada and English considering that these kids were kannada medium educated uptil last year

The story with its bandits and my Gabbar singh kind of act "Kitne admi the" and "maaf kar do sarkaar " effect was enjoyed thoroughly by the kids

Finally I chose few kids to enact it as a drama. Helped them to modulate voice and together we called it a day

Moved on to the 6th A class .Did the same act

The kids shook hands.

One kid came over and said his mom worked in the same software area as I do. 

The difference being , me a software employee and his mom a contract helper staff.

..and when you reach to kids from that section of the society, you know you have done it right.

Thank you Vani for spreading the joy of reading!

View more pictures from the International Literacy Day Celebrations.

This blog contains stories sent in by all our champions. Browse through the blog for more stories. You can also go through the tags on the right side of the blog to find stories happening in your own city.

Note : If any of you want to be a Pratham Books Champion and join us on our journey of getting 'a book in every child's hand', write to us at web(at)prathambooks(dot)org.