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Celebrate BookTrust’s Children’s Book Week at your school with bumper Great Books Guide
BookTrust, the UK’s largest children’s reading charity today unveils its 2017 Great Books Guide to celebrate Children’s Book Week. The guide highlights some of the brilliant books that have been published in the past year that will help families along their reading journey.
This year, for the very first time, BookTrust’s Great Books Guide includes book recommendations for 0-5s and 12 plus, so all children have access to and can find the fun in stories. The guide highlights 60 books that BookTrust thinks are great and that children will want to read – books that are funny, sad, informative, scary and silly (and everything in between).
Children who enjoy reading have better life chances. Reading enjoyment also helps to build confidence, wellbeing, development, attainment and social skills.
Diana Gerald, CEO of BookTrust said: “BookTrust’s aim with Children’s Book Week is simple – to help children love books and stories. We believe that the right book is always the book that a child actually wants to read, and we hope that within the pages of our guide you’ll find the “right” book for lots of children in your school.”
Author and BookTrust’s writer in residence, Taran Matharu said: “Children's Book Week is hugely important, dedicating time to help children find the books they need to reignite their passion for reading.”
Research has shown that if teachers read children’s books first hand they can make more informed recommendations to their students.
Jon Hall, Assistant Head Teacher and English Lead at Green Lane Primary Academy said “One of our school aims is to nurture a love of reading in our children, not just because it is important for their attainment, but because we want them to be readers for life. However, it is not always easy for teachers or parents to find the time to keep up with children’s books. The Great Books Guide is a valuable resource as it provides us with recommendations we can trust and introduces us to brand new authors. The suggested age brackets also make it easy for us to know which children are most likely to enjoy them and help us share book recommendations with parents too, so we can support them in developing a reading culture at home.”
To help you celebrate Children’s Book Week this year, BookTrust has some handy tips and advice for schools to have fun sharing stories.
Tips for schools
- Create a cosy 'book nook' - turn a corner of your classroom or library into an area where pupils can relax and enjoy reading books. The more cushions, the better! Look through our Great Books Guide for some of our favourite recent reads for children.
- Tell some stories - encouraging children to read for pleasure is about more than just getting them to pick up a book - it's equally as important to appreciate a good story. Read a book with your class at the end of each day for 20 minutes, and let them simply sit back and enjoy…
- Involve parents and carers - see if you can get parents and carers to join in with Children's Book Week. You could invite them to take part in the fun of Storytime, or share a book with their child one afternoon in school.
- Have a dress-up day - what better way to celebrate stories, than becoming the characters in them! Ask your pupils to dress up as their favourite character from a book. You could even let them have fun making their own outfits and props in class.
- Bring a book to life - act out one of your class's favourite books - maybe one from our Great Books Guide. Let the children grab some props, musical instruments and whatever else they want out, and have some fun re-telling the story together.
- Hold a book club - set up a fun lunchtime book club, where pupils can enjoy discussing books and stories in more detail. Make it relaxed, cosy, and don't forget the snacks!
- Start writing - Children's Book Week opens up lots of great opportunities for you to encourage your pupils to write. Why not suggest they write a review of their favourite book or create a character profile? If you display these in your book corner, they may go on to help other pupils looking for their next exciting book to read.
- Get creative - Let your pupils get arty by drawing their favourite characters from different books, creating their own personalised bookmarks or even designing their own book covers. Get out the paints, crayons and glitter, and have some fun!
Arrange a special visitor - Children's Book Week is an ideal time to arrange for an author or illustrator to visit your school and inspire the pupils about reading and writing.