Search Results

COVID-19 may have steam-rollered its way through most of this year's Literary Festivals, but the organisers of one of the biggest, Bath Festival, have refused to allow the crisis to halt its activities. Instead, they've gone online with a digital 6-day festival of free, inclusive and engaging digital events for schools and families. The event, which started at the weekend, is called the 'Reading is Magic Festival', a name inspired by Cressida Cowell's key message as the current Waterstones Children’s Laureate: 'reading is magic, and magic is for everyone'. The award-winning children’s author and creator of the How to Train Your Dragon and The Wizards of Once book series said, 'Books have a transformative magic in their unique ability to develop three key magical powers; intelligence, creativity and empathy.' Cressida Cowell will be joined by an all-star line-up of leading authors and illustrators, including Schoolreaders' Author-Supporter Robin Stevens and Chris Riddell. Events will be streamed live online and can be viewed on demand once they are over - visit www.readingismagicfestival.com to find out more and for a full list of events.

'The Write Offs', an empowering and uplifting new two-part series hosted by Sandi Toksvig will explore Britain’s low adult literacy rates and offer a group of adults – aged from 22 to 66 years old – a life-changing opportunity to overcome the one thing that has always held them back. The eight adults, all of whom lack the basic skills necessary for many everyday situations, have different personal motivations for wanting to improve their literacy. From the 66-year-old town crier who hopes to one day write a thank you letter to all those who’ve supported him to the young mum who wants to be able to help her kids with their homework, all the contributors are united in their quest to shed the shame and lift the stigma around illiteracy. Each member of the group will receive one-to-one tuition over a four-month period, during which they will also face a series of extraordinary reading, writing and spelling challenges that will put their new found reading, writing and spelling skills to the test. Sandi Toksvig says, “Working on The Write Offs has been one of the great honours of my working life. I have had the extraordinary pleasure of spending time with eight courageous people who have approached their deepest fears with humour and determination. Like me, I just know not only will everyone fall in love with them, they will review what they think they know about reading and writing. I believe the ripple effect from these eight will be astonishing.“ 'The Write Offs' is on Channel 4 on Tuesday 22nd September at 9.30pm.

We're delighted that Kathy's amazing work for Schoolreaders is being recognised and celebrated. Kathy had always been an active and energetic supporter of Schoolreaders, but when we were forced to stop all operations at the start of lockdown, Kathy came into her own. A retired teacher who had always loved reading aloud to her classes, Kathy was a natural in front of the camera when we launched 'Schoolreaders Storytime'. This online video scheme was put together by our team almost overnight and meant that we could still keep providing a useful service to schools, and could keep inspiring children with a love of stories. Quite quickly we were able to make 'Schoolreaders Storytime' videos available to more than 1,500 schools, and teachers reported that our films were a wonderful way to keep children engaged with books while in isolation at home. Kathy has been shortlisted as Volunteer of the Year in the Third Sector Excellence Awards 2020. These prestigious awards recognise the achievements of charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises in the UK and we are delighted and proud that Kathy has been shortlisted.

Arthur Polhill, aged 13, has just completed a tremendous challenge on our behalf. Over 100 consecutive days this summer, he walked 500 miles, and has raised more than £1000 to support children's reading. Arthur says that he was inspired by NHS hero Captain Tom’s incredible fundraising, and wanted to do something to help children who missed out on schooling during lockdown. He was accompanied on walks around his Bedfordshire home by family members and by his two dogs, Daisy and Margot, who have apparently been great walking companions. And Arthur hummed the Proclaimers 1987 hit, '500 Miles' to keep himself going! PHOTO, copyright www.bedfordtoday.co.uk

The National Archives celebrates the 175th anniversary of the birth of artist, printmaker and wallpaper designer Walter Crane with an in-depth look at how Crane transformed children's book design in the second half of the 19th century. Walter Crane (1845-1915) was the son of a portraitist father and was apprenticed to a wood-engraver when just 13 years old. This led him into a career in book illustration with a particular focus on children's books. As he later explained, the standard of children's printed books at the time was deplorable: ‘The books for babies...of the cheaper sort called toy books were not very inspiriting. These were generally careless and unimaginative woodcuts, very casually coloured by hand, dabs of pink and emerald green being laid on across faces and frocks with a somewhat reckless aim.’ Crane’s own elaborate, highly imaginative woodcuts, partly inspired by Japanese prints which were then all the rage, raised the standard considerably and turned his children's books into works of art. The National Archives sum up Crane’s success in children’s book illustration as coming down to his understanding that 'all of the elements of the book as an object, including its content, decoration and manufacturing contributed to the child’s experience of it. He achieved this by applying the principles of the Arts and Crafts movement, where form followed function, and by using a combination of decorative art and pictorial representations to illustrate them'. To read a full article about Crane's work and to see many more of his illustrations, visit: https://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/the-art-of-learning-to-read-with-walter-crane/ The National Archive, the official archive and publisher for the UK Government, describes itself as 'the guardian of over 1,000 years of iconic national documents'. Do visit their website which boasts a great archive of podcasts, a wonderful blog, and lots of live author webchats and Q&A sessions. www.nationalarchives.gov.uk Image copyright: The National Archive

The annual report of the Education Policy Institute, published on 26th August, reveals that the disadvantage gap in schools has stopped closing for the first time in a decade. Key findings include: - Disadvantaged pupils in England are 18.1 months of learning behind their peers by the time they finish their GCSEs – the same gap as five years ago. - The gap at primary school increased for the first time since 2007 – which may signal that the gap is set to widen in the future. - The stalling of the gap occurred even before the COVID-19 pandemic had hit the education system. The report focuses on educational attainment in general, not specifically on literacy, but as a cornerstone of all learning, literacy acquisition is almost certainly following the same trajectory. To read the full report, visit https://epi.org.uk/publications-and-research/education-in-england-annual-report-2020/

Have you spent time during the last few months getting creative? Whether you've been taking photos, painting, experimenting with needlework or doing some entirely different craft, you can put your efforts to good use by entering our CREATE! competition. We're asking you to send us a photo of your lockdown projects and to make a small donation to Schoolreaders. We've got an amazing panel of judges lined up to look at your creations; superstar pottery entrepreneur Emma Bridgewater, photographer Harry Cory Wright, artist Hugo Guinness and embroiderer and sewer Sarah Frost. They'll be awarding fabulous prizes in four categories and the winners and some runners up will have their works displayed at London art gallery, Wilson Stephens & Jones. OUR JUDGES: Emma Bridgewater, Sarah Frost, Harry Cory Wright and Hugo Guinness The competition closes on 8th September so if you haven't already, tap into your creative energy and channel some of it towards helping children who desperately need literacy support. Click here to find out more!

This sobering statistic, which refers to secondary pupils, comes in a report from the National Foundation for Educational Research (1). Schools with the highest number of children eligible for free school meals reported that only 48% of pupils were engaged with learning activities, compared with 66% and 77% of pupils at schools in the middle and lowest brackets. And while lots of children are getting fantastic support at home, there are many who are not: On average, teachers say that 55% of their pupils' parents are engaged with their children's home learning. But the report also reveals that teachers from the most deprived schools report a lower parental engagement, at 41%. A report published by UCL's Institute of Education, 'Schoolwork in Lockdown' (2) shows similarly worrying trends. It says that, on average, children are doing 2.5 hours of schoolwork per day. However, this varies widely, with 20% doing less than an hour, and 17% doing more than four hours. And there seems to be a marked north/south divide, with 28% of children in the south-east doing more than four hours of offline schoolwork a day, compared with only 9% in the north-east. If these patterns are also evident in primary school children's learning during the COVID-19 crisis, the need for one-to-one support once schools fully re-open is going to be enormous. Thank you to all who support Schoolreaders by volunteering and donating; you will be playing a vital role in getting children back on the path to good literacy and a decent life. NOTES (1) Lucas, M., Nelson, J. and Sims, D. (June 2020). Schools’ Responses to Covid-19: Pupil Engagement in RemoteLearning. Slough: NFER. www.nfer.ac.uk (2) Green, Francis ‘Schoolwork in lockdown: new evidence on the epidemic of educational poverty’, published by the Centre for Learning and Life Chances in Knowledge Economies and Societies at: http://www.llakes.ac.uk

Savannah-based artist Bethany Buckley uses pages torn from books, magazines and newspapers to make extraordinary sculptures. Sometimes they simply represent scenes from her imagination, but often she uses pages from a specific work to represent figures and themes from that very same book, taking pleasure in creating imagined visuals where none have existed before. See below her introspective figure of Esther Greenwood, heroine of Sylvia Plath's Bell Jar. Bickley says that she enjoys the act of merging narrative and imagery “to tell a story with impact and purpose. If there are no visuals, I create them.” Visit www.bethany-bickley.squarespace.com to see more of Bethany's creations. Images © Bethany Bickley

That's our view and it's also the view of award-winning online seller of audiobooks, Audible. The company has just announced that for as long as schools are shut in the UK, children will be able to access completely free audiobooks via its site, www.stories.audible.com. From today children everywhere can instantly stream an incredible collection of stories, including titles across six different languages, that will help them continue dreaming and learning. There are titles for all age groups and there's no need to set up an account or remember passwords; simply visit the above page, click the 'start listening' button - and choose your book. Given the huge range, that could be the hardest part!

Over the coming months we may all find ourselves spending more time than usual at home and some of us may even have to spend long periods entirely alone. Not a happy situation for those who are gregarious and like to be active and to socialise. We're encouraged by Joan Bakewell, the government's former 'voice' of older people, to use the time in a positive way; she rightly suggests that finding a routine, exercising, and perhaps brushing up on tech skills so that we can entertain ourselves and keep up with family and friends, will all be helpful. Perhaps it's even time to delve more deeply into a subject that you've always been interested in but never had a chance to pursue. The Open University offers nearly 1000 completely free online course via its offshoot, 'OpenLearn'. The courses are set up to offer absolute flexibility; there are no set term dates, you can spend as long as you like on each course and if you finish a course, you can be awarded a Certificate of Participation. The subject lineup is amazing - How to be a Critical Reader, Introduction to Child Psychology, Art in Renaissance Venice, Discovering Music - The Blues, Why Sustainable Energy Matters, the Novels of Thomas Hardy, Textiles of Ghana, Travel in the Steam Age, Beginners Welsh - we challenge you not to be intrigued by at least one or two of the brilliant subjects on offer! Visithttps://www.open.edu/openlearn/free-courses/full-catalogue to find out more and to sign up.

It's that time of year again... World Book Day is today, Thursday 5th March. Children in more than 100 countries will spend the day celebrating the power and joy of reading in a multitude of different ways. Primary schools across this country are filled with what Alice O'Keefe in the Guardian describes as 'overexcited, undersized BFGs, Mary Poppinses and Gruffalos'. For many children much of the fun of WBD is the dressing up, but inventive teachers all over the country are coming up with imaginative ideas to make sure that the focus of the day remains on books and reading. Schools in Gosport, Hampshire are asking children to get creative - pupils at St John's C of E Primary School are recreating scenes from their favourite books, with potatoes - appropriately sculpted and accessorised - taking the parts of the main characters. Meanwhile, in Scunthorpe, children have been using their favourite book covers as inspiration for decorating their classroom doors, and local librarians are coming in to judge their efforts. And in Swindon, one school has organised a 'Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?' quiz; a dining table has been laid with food and props relating to different book characters, and the children have to guess who the guests at this amazing dinner party might be. A Tiger-who-came-to-tea-themed 'Book Door' in Scunthorpe 'Guess Who's Coming To Dinner' quiz tables PHOTOGRAPHS: © World Book Day