MP Stapleton-Simmonds Reads to Students on World Read Aloud Day

By Devonne Cornelius

St. Kitts and Nevis (WINN) — Member of Parliament for St. Thomas’ Parish (Nevis 5) the Hon. Cleone Stapleton-Simmonds visited her alma mater the St. Thomas’ Primary School on Wednesday, February 03, 2021, to read to students as part of World Read Aloud Day.

Hon. Stapleton-Simmonds, who is a former teacher, donated two books and read one of them entitled “Mama and Little Joe” to the students of Grade Four (4) Courage.

“I asked the students for their interpretation of the story. The two that stood out to me were: “We should always be kind, helpful and loving” and “We should keep a clean heart and not a dirty one!” Hon. Stapleton-Simmonds wrote on her Facebook page.

Each year on February 03, schools and educational institutions around the world commemorate World Read Aloud Day which is now in its twelfth year.

This year, World Read Aloud Day is being celebrated under the theme “Literacy, an imperative we must embrace in 2021”.

Presented by global literacy non-profit LitWorld and sponsored by Scholastic, the annual literacy celebration advocates for greater access to literacy through diverse stories, as well as the power of reading aloud. This has shown to have an immense impact on the academic and cognitive development of a child, and as suggested by a recent national survey of 4,517 public school educators in the US*, their social-emotional well-being too.