National Simultaneous Storytime: Many tongues tell same tale

Thousands of Australian children sat in front of a storyteller last Tuesday as part of National Simultaneous Storytime.

At Craigieburn library, SBS Radio’s Punjabi broadcaster Manpreet Singh read to children in her mother tongue as well as English.

Now in it’s 16th year, the storytelling event brought together a record number of children – more than 500,000 across 3100 locations – who all sat down to read a story together in libraries, kindergartens and schools across the country.

It was the first year the annual event, which aims to encourage more young people to read and enjoy books, was in partnership with SBS.

Audiobooks have been recorded in 16 different languages, including Arabic and Italian, and are on the SBS website.

www.sbs.com.au/radio/simultaneousstorytime