Our work in the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford

Since 2011, we have been providing books and stories to the John Radcliffe Hospital. Given that we had only started with a pilot of the service in other hospitals the year before, we were still very unsure about whether it would work. As we’re still working in Oxford over a decade later, we’ve definitely learned the answer to that one!

With nearly 10,000 books and countless hours of storytelling provided since then, our work has been making an incredible impact to children of all ages on the wards of the John Radcliffe Hospital.

Children and their families soak up traditional tales and enchanting stories from our highly experienced storyteller, Adele. Adele has an amazing ability to sensitively draw them into stories and distract them from the challenging situations they face.

“I just wanted to let you know how invaluable the Read for Good books have been during this lockdown period. . . . We’ve been sending a book to each child we work with, and have had some lovely feedback from parents and staff. Parents aren’t allowed down to theatre with children at the moment, so a member of the play team has to accompany each child – one told us that yesterday she was able to read the Winnie the Witch book all the way to the theatre . . . a perfect distraction.”

Teacher, John Radcliffe Hospital