How are you celebrating World Book Day?

Ask any parent what they most want from their children’s school and they will probably put two things at the top of their list. They will want their children to be happy and safe and they will want them to read fluently and widely.

Now this World Book Day there will be plenty of evidence of schools stressing safety and happiness. Modern schools are very secure with key pads, checks on personnel and supervision. They are usually also bright with lots of displays. What can we do to make them reading-rich environments too?

Well, let’s start with the entrance. Do books and reading leap out at you the moment you walk in? If not, let’s have book-stands and carousels, posters of the children’s favourite authors, books displayed on tables. Let’s have photographs of the teachers, children and respected members of the local community reading their favourite books. You can have a ‘who’s reading’ competition.

Readers are photographed with just their eyes showing over their book. Get people photographed reading their favourite books in unusual places: the Hundred Mile an Hour Dog on top of a kennel, the Little Mermaid in a swimming pool, Winnie the Pooh with a toy Tigger leaning over their shoulder. Let’s have those books laid out so that they can be borrowed. Have books and bookmarks as prizes.

OK, now we’re cooking. Hopefully there is money in the school budget so you can invite an author, illustrator or poet in to talk to the children and inspire them to pick up a book. If not, get somebody from the library service to read some really cool books. You could have a Skype interview with an author or play clips of them from YouTube. After all, reading is now part of the digital age.

What about those assemblies? Have a teacher, a child and a respected member of the community, a firefighter, nurse, lollipop lady, sports personality or broadcaster introduce the school to their favourite book. Project the front cover behind them as they speak. To support it make posters of all those individuals displayed against backgrounds made of their favourite book setting. Have the head teacher fighting dragons, the caretaker dancing with Mary Poppins or the cook serving Wonka Bars to her or his customers.

Decorate the library with children’s work. They can do book reviews, design book covers, film posters of their favourite book, board games based on it too. They can design bookmarks and character sketches. They can plan out sequels and prequels. They can write their favourite character’s biography, send them a letter or postcard or even make them a birthday card.

Then there is the ubiquitous dressing up day. Don’t just ask the children to dress up as a favourite character. Have themed school lunches with the parents making cakes decorated as book covers or characters. Have a competition for the best one. Make it the Great British Story Book Bake Off.
So let’s create a buzz around World Book Day. Children learn to read best when they read often, widely and for pleasure. Better still, make every day World Book Day.

We want to know how you're celebrating World Book Day in your classroom. Tweet us @FreedomToTeach or leave us a comment below (with your email address!) and we'll send you a free copy of Lone Wolf by Alan Gibbons - part of the Collins Read On series!

Wish you were...analysing language!

Being able to comment on the effects of language choices is essential to achieving grade C and above in GCSE English. Nonetheless students often struggle with this, getting tangled up in knots listing any literary terms they can remember and forgetting that the foundation of all language is words.

A recent way that I have tried to re-focus students on the importance of word choices was by using postcards. A colleague recommended cutting up a text and sticking a small section of it onto blank postcards so that a larger extract could be unpacked by students in more detail.

I tried this out with a year 10 class last week, in a lesson on ‘Of Mice and Men.’ I had never taught this class before and found out moments before beginning the lesson that they had never read the book. Trying to get the students to answer the question ‘How does the language in the extract influence your view of Crooks?’ suddenly seemed not only foolish but impossible.

However, the postcard method really worked!  I provided students with three different colours of pen to help them annotate the extract, by focussing on three different types of description. Breaking up the text on the postcards, forced the students to really examine the words used by Steinbeck. The different coloured pens allowed them to quickly visualise how Steinbeck’s word choices worked together (or apart). The feedback session was really fruitful as we were able to explore how Steinbeck’s use of words varied and developed across the text and how this related to the historical context.

The best ideas are often the simplest and this is a really simple one. Breaking up a text into smaller chunks is certainly not a new suggestion and using coloured pens to annotate is something I am sure we have all done before. Putting these two together, however, allowed these students to untangle language choices rather than getting tied up in knots with literary terms.

Try it for yourself! Download the resources below:

- Of Mice and Men Language Lesson Plan
- Of Mice and Men Language Lesson PowerPoint

Naomi Hursthouse

Read to Succeed!

As English teachers we all know the benefits of reading. However, it can be more difficult persuading others in school of this. And I do not just mean the students!

I've done some work helping to lead a county-wide working party focussing on developing reading cultures in school. It turns out that it is even more important than English teachers might realise to encourage our students to read. Research by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD, 2002) showed that reading for enjoyment is more important for children’s educational success than their family’s socio-economic status.  So establishing a positive culture about reading across the whole school is imperative if we are going to help all our students to succeed.

One of the most inspiring ideas that I have heard about is ‘Drop Everything and Read.’ I first heard about this on the marvellous Teachers’ TV film, KS3 Reading- Seven Great Ideas  based at Werneth School in Stockport. The idea is that every couple of weeks, students will be warned that they will have a ‘Drop Everything and Read’ day coming up and they will need to bring in a book to school. At some point that day a bell will ring and all staff and students will need to, literally, drop everything and read.

This is across the whole school, so whether students are in P.E or History, they will stop whatever they are doing, get out their book and read. The footage of this is fantastic- teachers and students reading in weird and wonderful places, with the indefatigable librarians running around the school photographing the event for their notice-board. And it is really is an event. But as with all events it needs to have everyone on-board from the top to the bottom. The most powerful aspect of this idea is that it creates a culture in the school where everyone reads- whether they are the Head-teacher, a member of the Canteen staff or a year 9 student.

After showing this film to our working party, one teacher became so enthused that she went back to her school and within a month had set up a similar event. She had begun by having ‘Drop Everything and Read’ sessions in English lessons, which the students became almost as enthusiastic about as the teachers involved, and then after a couple of weeks rolled out the system to the whole school.

This involved having to organise book boxes for classrooms round the school (for those students who forgot their own); a massive advertising campaign, using modified Lord Kitchener posters and presentations in assemblies; and, most importantly, the support of senior management in persuading all staff that this is a valid use of their lesson time.

Frankly, I was amazed at how much she had managed to get done and how quickly. It has certainly put me to shame - I still need to fight the good fight with our senior management - but I am inspired now to get on with it. After all, I want our students to succeed so what better way than to drop everything and read? 


Naomi Hursthouse