Ten children from villages and slums, living on the outskirts of New Delhi, were the chief guests today to launch 10 books and animated stories, authored by two legends, Dr. Abdul Kalam and Dr. Kiran Bedi. "Legendary Lives" is an innovative reading product by Puducherry-based BookBox. Dilip Chenoy, MD and CEO, National Skill Development Corporation was the Guest of Honour. Brij Kothari, co-founder of BookBox talked about the use of technology for mass literacy. Kiran Bedi interacted with the press and Rahul Ram of Indian Ocean Band performed a song from Peepli Live.
The "Legendary Lives" series of children's books and animated stories, distributed by Orient BlackSwan, brings to life anecdotes from the life of icons we tend to glorify from a distance. Such icons too were ordinary people once before they went on to do extraordinary things. The series captures the human side that is often obscured by the stellar power of their achievements.
A social enterprise born from a student-led business plan competition at Stanford University in the US, BookBox innovated the concept of "AniBooks"or animated stories to support early literacy and language development. BookBox's mission is, quite simply, "A book for every child in her/his language." To achieve this goal, a "book" was first defined as a reading experience that can travel in print and all audio-visual media, such as, TV, mobile phones, media players and computers. To overcome the distribution and linguistic limitations of print, BookBox additionally pipes reading to children on screens. The books are targeted at children between the age group of 5-10 years.
Speaking on the occasion Dr. Kiran Bedi said, "I must congratulate BookBox for having come out with this innovative yet simple approach for the benefit of children. I feel glad to share my life experiences with BookBox in the making of "Legendary Lives.""BookBox's COO Nirav Shah said, "We've been to village after village and not found a single children's book there. We felt compelled to do something. BookBox is our answer to delivering the reading experience to children, on screens that they already watch."
Since children love to watch cartoons, AniBooks have animated stories with the narration stripping along as subtitles in the "same" language as the audio. Same Language Subtitling or "SLS"is a scientifically proven technique that supports literacy and language learning because it is known to cause an automatic reading response. SLS was first implemented on Bollywood songs on TV for mass literacy, prompting former US President, Bill Clinton to call it "a small thing that has a staggering impact on people's lives". He also comments that "SLS" doubles the number of functional readers among primary school children.
BookBox is a social enterprise that innovated the concept of "AniBooks"or animated stories to support early literacy and language skills. BookBox follows a 360 degree strategy for content development and distribution, as printed books and AniBooks on any screen. BookBox has partnered with Orient BlackSwan to actualize its 360 degree strategy. See: www.bookbox.com Orient BlackSwan has been publishing, since 1948, books for children that blend education and entertainment in innovative and contemporary formats. The company is known for its strong sense of social responsibility and an unerring instinct for quality that motivates its publishing ventures. The "Legendary Lives" series, which is the 5th set of Storytellers, reasserts Orient BlackSwan's commitment to promoting reading habits among children, acquiring and developing sensitive, culture-specific content for children's stories, and a lively, multi-media approach to learning
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