This year for the first time I ran a Y6 bookclub before school. We started by looking at books in themed groups. There was no pressure to read anything - the idea was to listen to peers discuss their reading 1/9
It was quite a commitment to come to school early every Tuesday. But every child who started, continued to come every week. We had pastries and talked about books. It was informal and fun and a non-judgemental safe space 2/9
Children started reading books they had never thought about before. We looked at books on witches, time travel, refugees & evacuees, sports books and many more. The children could pick their own books on the theme and they could be non-fiction, picture books, graphic novels. 3/9
In the summer term we held a book world cup in which they each championed a book of their choosing in the group stages, and yesterday we held the final 4/9
The children have been overhead discussing and debating the merits of the books in break and lunch time. The boys are now reading a range of books that they had ‘dismissed’ as girly. The children came up to me at their ‘prom’ to tell me about their reading choices! 5/9
Some children are reading classics – challenging their reading in unchartered waters. For the book world cup we had everything championed from Nibbles the Book Monster to A Little Princess, Enid Blyton to Sarah Crossan 6/9
One boy told me that some of the books made him laugh and some cry. He has never had such a range of emotion. One boy who only read football biographies told me yesterday that Apple and Rain was the best book he’d ever read. 7/9
Our world cup final is Wonder vs Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret. The children talk about ‘coming-of-age’, they have discussed empathy, bullying, friendship, bras!, first romance, first and third person narratives, points of view, novel beginnings, satisfactory endings. 8/9
It was about 25 minutes a week during term time only. They are now a class of experienced, happy, fulfilled readers with plans to read more and more and more and more. Take the children out the classroom and expose them to reading for pleasure. And pleasure they shall find. 9/9
