Photos: Sergio Betancort.
Students from 5th and 6th grade of El Quintero school in San Bartolomé, together with their teacher, Luz María Duque Dorta, gathered at the Municipal Cyberlibrary to carry out a cultural event called "Poetic Journey: Canary Islands, Poetry and Music".
This initiative arose from the group of readers who come every first Thursday of the month to practice reading aloud. Tere Perera, as spokesperson for the group, presented this initiative to the teacher Luz María Duque, who together with Daniel Aguiar, classmate, decided to get to work. They invited the 42 students from the 5th and 6th grade courses to participate, of which only 9 committed to take this step.
For this first appointment, the teachers chose poems by Canarian writers, such as Josefina Plá, María Jesús Alvarado, Pepa González, Marcos Hormiga and José María Millares Sall, among others.
With this initiative, the aim was not only for the student to value reading aloud, but also to give it a correct intonation. Something very fundamental when reading in public, such as not covering your face, looking into the eyes, or respecting with silence to then act correctly before the public, was also taken into account. Each of the interventions were musically accompanied by the guitar of Luz María Duque, who chose some works by composers such as Blas Sánchez, Héctor Ayala, Sebastián Zambrana and Leo Brower, among others.
This novel project began in the first quarter and part of the second, and in order to carry it out, the participating students had to forgo recess. But the enthusiasm and desire with which the students welcomed it was worth it. The hall of the Municipal Cyberlibrary became too small to accommodate family and friends of the students, who did not want to miss the meeting.
