Autumn is said to be the best season for reading in Japan. The weather makes you want to cuddle up inside a blanket and read a fascinating book while staring at the beautiful autumn leaves outside.

That is why this year, we held an event to close the distance between children’s hearts and books.

This month’s topic for icoima, our event series for local children, is book autumn. If you want to know more about what icoima exactly is, check out this article↑.

 

Reading Books to Children

The first part of the event included reading books to children to inspire them to read more in their everyday life.

Even though we could have been the ones who read aloud picture books to the children, none of the SEKAI HOTEL internship students read to the children. We wanted other children of a higher grade to do that to bring the children closer to eachother.

The purpose of this activity is to have the children form a relationship and become like older brothers and older sisters.

”I met her for the first time today, but she is so cool.”

That is what we want the children to think, even through a simple thing as reading.

When we chose the children who were going to read books to the other ones, they all looked a little indecisive and insecure.

But as soon as they embraced their role and started reading stories out loud, their eyes became confident and they looked responsible like an older sibling.

And they read to the younger children carefully and carefully so that everyone understands.

The younger children must have thought that the older children looked so cool.

 

Reading-Passbook

The next part of the event included receiving comments from the children about the books they had read.

We prepared a reading card called “Reading-Passbook” for the children to write their impressions.

It’s basically like a passbook you get at the bank, its goal being saving money.

However with this reading passbook, what you can save isn’t money, but the number of pages of the book you read.

To help the children, we as staff fill in the date, the title of the book and the number of pages every event. The children will then all write their thoughts diligently in silence.

To save more pages, in addition to the books read aloud, the children began reading the books that we had prepared at the venue.

The passbook is like a promise that will bring the children back to the front of SEKAI HOTEL when all their passbooks are filled, to show us their progress. It’s a promise of community.

How many children will have read books and how many pages will they all have saved? We are looking forward to seeing it.

 

Book Cover and Bookmark Making

The last part of the event was book cover and bookmark crafting.

We used craft paper for the book covers and drawing paper for the bookmarks.

The children decorated their papers colorfully and made their own designs.

One child, who loves to draw, painted a beautiful picture on her paper.

Another child made their own uniquely formed bookmark, using masking tape

Other children wanted to use some English on their covers so the staff helped them form sentences in English.

The children all made incredibly individual and unique book covers and marks and were having a lot of fun.

 

Filling Nishikujo with Smiles

What can we do for the people in Nishikujo?

This question is something we always have in mind when planning events with icoima in Nishikujo.

We want our activities to lead to the smiles of everyone in Nishikujo, which is why in the future as well, we will keep looking for the answer to this question.

Thank you to everyone who participated in our icoima event!

See you next time!