Sasha Salmina once said, “A child who reads will be an adult who thinks,” however, as time goes by, youngsters do not make the choice to read books beyond their school ones. What can we do to persuade them that reading extracurricular books is beneficial?

School plays an important role in teenagers’ lives as this is where they spend most of their time. Apart from school, they are chatting, surfing the internet, and playing video games. One possible way for them to read more extracurricular books is to create more school libraries where students could borrow books, do various activities, be part of conversations in book clubs, and most of all: enjoy themselves. Consequently, students will draw their attention in library activities.

Another way to solve this problem is to reduce the course load in the high school curriculum. Generally, youngsters have too much studying to do, in my opinion, because of their full schedules. Therefore, they have insufficient free time for extra reading and other leisure activities. If their homework gets reduced, this means that they will have more time for various things such as reading books and participating in the library’s activities.

Another option would be to organize book bazaars, in which we could sell brand new or second-hand books in reasonable prices. For instance, books, even in these times of crisis, can commonly be quite expensive. Who would not prefer to buy a book for an inexpensive price?

To conclude, in my opinion, if book bazaars are organized and schools create more libraries, literature activities, and book clubs while decreasing homework, teenagers will be willing to read extracurricular books.

What do you think? How can we inspire a love of reading in younger generations?

--Natasha