Call for diverting children’s attention towards reading and writing

The closing ceremony of ‘Aao Likhein Kahani’ (ALK), an initiative to promote reading and writing among children was held at a hotel on Saturday.

Sania Saeed, the chief guest at the event, spoke about the importance of reading and writing for children. She emphasised how initiatives like the ALK could prove beneficial in developing creative abilities in children.

The closing ceremony was organised to celebrate 15 young story writers who were shortlisted among 30 candidates to participate in the event. The top 5 stories were developed into audio-visual stories and the children were awarded with educational prizes.

The remaining 25 children will have their works published by the FK Squared, which conceived the ALK along with the SEED Ventures, in a digital book. The initiative was designed to develop the story writing and critical thinking abilities of children in Pakistan. Children from across Pakistan participated in the competition.

From a pool of 1,200 applications, 30 children were shortlisted through an online essay writing competition and were inducted into a 5-day online boot camp where they were trained by experienced creative writing trainers in how to develop stories and illustrations.

A ten-part speaker series by experts from the world of literature, content development and illustration were developed on the skill of writing and the importance of reading. Farhad Karamally, FK Squared director, said the development of stories into a digital book and audio-visual stories had been a great experience.