Help Promote Good Reading Habits in Kalimantan

Since receiving funds in February, thanks to Linklaters Singapore, YUM has started to purchase the material it needs to update the library, which includes 80 various books, a computer, arts and crafts materials, and 22 educational DVDs. The numbers of visitors to the library has also increased significantly in the last couple of months. The total visitor count in March was 1091 visitors for the month and in April there were 1221 visitors total. Fifty percent of the visitors are elementary schoolers (From 6-12 years old), 15% are Junior High Schoolers (from 12-15 years old), 11% are Senior High Schoolers (from 15-17 years old), and the rest are pre-schoolers and public visitors of various ages. This is a huge increase, of around 200%, from this time last year at which there were only about 500 visitors per month.

This newly increased number of visitors, especially elementary school students, results mostly due to the new books, the educational toys that they can play with, and also the dancing class which supplements the dancing that they do at YUM already. Comic books and novels for kids and teenagers are the most coveted books in the library, so much so that the children are always inquiring as to whether or not there are any new ones on their way. YUM will continue to purchase more books to keep the library updated and the demand satiated.

“I am very happy to come and play at YUM Library, because have so many good books that I can read or borrow. And also I enjoy the creativity activities – It’s so fun,” said Laela Yulida (3rd grade of Tangkiling Elementary School)

“The books at YUM Library are very variety and interesting. They have so many categories of books such as cultures, accountant, cooking recipe books, world leader story, novel  for children and teenagers, fable, comic books, magazines’, encyclopedias, and text books. I’m so excited because new books just arrived. What I read now is a new book about prophet story. There are a lot more interesting books,” said Mutdrika (3^rd grade of Tangkiling Elementary Schools)

Besides enjoying the activities, toys, and books, the children also like to learn English in the YUM Library English Club. Since there are some foreign volunteers who come to YUM Kalimantan to help with YUM programs, the children are able to learn English from them and get very excited to participate in activities with the volunteers. Please feel free to contact us if you think you may be interested in volunteering at any of the YUM initiatives in Kalimantan or Cipanas or to see how things are progressing in the field. You can email aris@yumindonesia.org. Individual or group volunteers are more than welcome to come. 

The Calistung activity “Read, Write and Count” also attracts more children to visit the library, because in this activity, the children who cannot do any of the aforementioned tasks can learn how to with the help of our devoted volunteers. There are unfortunately still some children who are in elementary school and who are illiterate or cannot count. For this reason, we try to recruit children from pre-school age until elementary children to join in the Calistung activity so it can prepare them to go to school and have a better education. In the future, we hope that we can develop this activity to be practiced at YUM Preschool in Kalimantan, to increase children’s education levels. Hopefully we can make it happen because a lot of children desperately need a quality education.

To continue all of the staggering progress we have already made, we open our arms wide for you all to join us in helping develop our community library in YUM Kalimantan. There are several ways you can do so by volunteering, donating, sponsoring, and more. We believe that through all your help especially from GlobalGiving supporters, we can make a better living and education for children in Kalimantan with the YUM Library. Thank you.