Its World Book Day 2022

So what is World Book Day?

You might know it as the day you get to dress up as your favourite story character and engage in fun book-related activities in primary school. Sure, playing outside dressed as Augustus Gloop would be fun for anyone but the reason World Book Day was started has a much deeper meaning.

Did you know in 2018, 27% of adults in the US did not read a single book? This may seem like a small number but let’s round 27% to 25.  That’s ¼ (one quarter) of adults. One quarter of adults also means one in every four. So, going off of this statistic,  if you lined up four American adults in 2018 at least one of them hadn’t read a single book. This personally, is a shocking statistic but  it may mean nothing to you. You may not be American, and you may not be an adult but things like this can happen anywhere and start from a young age. 

In the UK, 9 million adults are functionally illiterate and 1 in 5 children enter secondary school without being able to read or write properly. This is during a time when 83% of parents believe reading is the most important skill a child can learn.

Now that I’ve given you your stat for the day I’ll actually tell you what the point of World Book Day is. World Book Day was started on the 23rd of April 1995 by UNESCO (The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) as a worldwide celebration of books and reading. World Book Day is so significant that it is marked  in over 100 countries around the globe. The point of this special celebration is to encourage children all over the world to pick up a book and start reading. Instead of making reading a chore your mum makes you do every night, UNESCO’s goal was to make reading fun; an enjoyable, offline activity which is also very academically good for you.

A lot of you may know reading (and of course writing) is very important to us; it’s what our whole business is about! This is why World Book Day is such a special celebration for Aiyven and I so because of this we will be doing a special World Book Day book review on our YouTube channel (Mbawa Book Reviewers) and holding a giveaway in honour of World Book Day. The winner of the giveaway will win their very own free Happier Every Chapter Box so make sure you head over to our Instagram to find out how you can enter!

Thanks for reading and happy World Book Day!