I was delighted to be asked by Read For Good and Leicester-based literacy initiative Whatever it Takes to run workshops for 250 pupils at Leicester Racecourse and for one prize-winning school, Judgemeadow Community College. The plan was to cheer on students taking part in the Leicester city Readathon- a celebration of reading from 1st-12th October […]

I always struggle when trying to start writing a blog post for someone else. After all, it’s not my blog that the post will appear on, so there needs to be some sort of an introduction—but it’s very easy to slip in to Troy McClure from the Simpsons mode and say, ‘Hi, I’m Tom Percival! […]

“Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.” Charles William Eliot The last term of the final year of primary school comes with triumph and trepidation, exhaustion and excitement in equal measure. After two eye opening transition days for […]

Stories can provide a wonderful escape from scary things in life. As Roald Dahl wrote in Matilda: ‘books gave Matilda a hopeful and comforting message: You are not alone.’ But, for children staying in a hospital, often in pain or discomfort, how do they get all these amazing benefits of stories? That’s where Listening Books […]

As part of our World Book Day celebrations, we held a 24 hour Readathon and library sleepover in the Learning Hub. 24 pupils from years 7-9 and 4 members of staff took part in the Readathon and had a variety of reasons for signing up- Sam, who read 2 books during it, had some books […]

I’ve always been a big fan of Christmas – the twinkly lights, mince pies, mulled wine and hours watching films and playing Lego at home with my family, have been what makes it for me. But more recently, it’s been at work, in my job as Operations Manager at Read for Good, that Christmas has […]

To read or not to read? Asked what we like to do in our spare time and it will range from being on our phones to swimming. But what most people don’t realise is that reading actually widens our way of thinking. For someone who likes books it is a way of escaping the harsh […]

There’s something so magical about meeting the author of your favourite book and hearing about their inspiration for the story. As Bath Children’s Festival get underway this week, thousands of children will have the opportunity to do just this. My colleague, Heidi Perry and I have been lucky enough to have worked with Bath Children’s […]

Hello everyone! It’s the start of the second week of our summer holidays and we wanted to tell you about one of the things we’re doing over the summer. A couple of weeks ago we signed up to take part in Read For Good’s Big Holiday Read. The aim of the Big Holiday Read is […]

We are a group of 19 Literacy students at Willingdon Community School in Eastbourne who have participated in Readathon for the first time this year. We had three main aims from this project: raise money for Readathon, encourage ourselves to read for enjoyment outside of school and to inspire other students to read. The freeing […]