Reading For Pleasure

Wednesday, 25 January 2017

A letter to my class

Dear Deer,

Today I realised something very exciting! Did you know that you’re all readers now, every single one of you? I don’t mean that you all can read, because you’ve been able to do that since you were in Reception and Year One. That’s a different kind of reading, working out what all the sounds are and how to put them together. I mean that you’re readers; real, genuine, passionate readers. I spent a lot of time thinking about it on my way to school this morning (there was bad fog so I had to drive very slowly), and I’m going to try and show you that I’m right.

You’re readers because you remind me every single time when I forget about you sharing our Poem of the Day. You’re readers because you work brilliantly together to tidy up before story time, which means that you can squeeze every last minute out of it. You’re readers because you all get excited whenever a new book arrives in the classroom. You’re readers because you work so hard to keep the school library up and running. You’re readers because you love talking about your favourite books at every possible opportunity. You’re readers because you want to share the books you enjoy with children lower down the school.

In fact, now that I’ve started, let me be even more specific…

Lauren, you’re a reader because as soon as you found out that there was another book written by Katherine Rundell, you marched straight down to the school library to find it.

Troy, you’re a reader because you think very carefully about which picture book you’re going to share with the children in Reception at story time.

Liam, you’re a reader because you love looking at books with beautiful illustrations and trying to recreate them.

Charley, you’re a reader because you got so emotionally involved when we read One Dog and His Boy together and sat there with tears streaming down your face.

Isobel, you’re a reader because you squealed with joy when you found out that there might be a third Varjak Paw book one day.

Nico, you’re a reader because you insisted that your mum read Wonder straight after you did, so that she could see what you were so excited about.

Gracie, you’re a reader because you spend every spare minute talking about how amazing you think Lyra Belacqua and Katniss Everdeen are.

Rubie, you’re a reader because you read the books that you enjoy and you don’t care what anyone else thinks about them.

Hollie, you’re a reader because you spend your playtimes reading the Eddie poems by Michael Rosen to anyone who'll listen.

Jack, you’re a reader because you love sending the class photos on Twitter of the purchases you make at the different bookshops you visit.

Andrew, you’re a reader because you can recall almost every record from Guinness World Records 2017 and you know straight away where to find any that you’re not sure of.

Alfie, you’re a reader because you can remember exactly what happened on page 264 of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (and on any page of any other Harry Potter book).

Marley, you’re a reader because you’ve read so many books and you’re always happy to share recommendations with your friends.

Layla, you’re a reader because you can give a detailed plot summary of every Jacqueline Wilson book ever published.

Oliver, you’re a reader because you’ve quietly been working your way through the Young Samurai series since September.

James, you’re a reader because you love finding out extra facts about whatever topic we’re studying, and you start virtually every sentence with ‘Did you know...?’

Romy, you’re a reader because you always want to try books that you shouldn’t really be reading quite yet. Don’t worry, their time will come…and when it does, you’ll love them even more.

Leo, you’re a reader because you carefully take your signed Tom Palmer book out of your drawer and sit reading it with a contented smile on your face.

Jack, you’re a reader because you’re not afraid to change a book that you’re not enjoying.

Gabriella, you’re a reader because you read Bridge to Terabithia time and time again. It’s wonderful that you enjoy it so much!

Christian, you’re a reader because you come in every morning (without fail!) and tell me about the latest developments in the Once series.

Sonny, you’re a reader because you turn up at school book council meetings absolutely full of fantastic suggestions about which books we can buy for the school.

James, you’re a reader because, after a whole year of reading nothing but Beast Quest, you were brave and tried the Ranger’s Apprentice books and The Hobbit. And Christian was right, you loved them!

Taylor, you’re a reader because you discovered the Barnaby Grimes books by Chris Riddell and are happy to tell everyone you meet about how exciting you think they are.

Maddison, you’re a reader because you got so angry and frustrated during ‘that’ chapter in Wonder.

Have I proved my point Deer Class? I really hope so. Thinking about all of this today meant that it was the most heart-warming and enjoyable drive to school that I’ve had for a very long time, so thank you all!

Mr Biddle

Friday, 6 January 2017

Reading Rivers

Hearing about children's reading at home after we return to school following a school holiday is an important part of our classroom routine. It's something that the children look forward to because it provides an opportunity to swap recommendations and share new books that they've enjoyed, and it's something that I look forward to because I get to find out about books that may have slipped through the net. This year, hot topics of conversation included Cogheart by Peter Bunzl, the Once series by Morris Gleitzman, Wonder by RJ Palacio, and The Midnight Gang by David Walliams. We also talked about various graphic novels and picture books that had been read (mostly Star Wars and spin-offs from The Phoenix comic), and discussed the fact that these are sometimes not viewed as 'real reading' by parents because they're 'too easy' and have pictures. This lead us on to a wider discussion about what real reading actually is and about what we might read during a typical day.

This reminded me of the Reading Rivers idea, which I'd heard about from Teresa Cremin, and had been meaning to try for a while. The idea was originally explored by Pamela Burnard (2002) and further developed by Gabrielle Cliff-Hodges (2010). It's a visual activity where the children make a collage (which can include drawings, photos, labels, etc) of all the text types that they 'flow through' during a certain time period.

My Reading River for a typical Sunday

I spent some time creating my own 24-hour Reading River so that I'd be able to introduce the idea to the class. Significant poetic licence was involved, as I'd have probably run out of blue ink if I'd printed Twitter logos for every time I actually 'check in' during a day. I tried to ensure that there was a variety of media involved and that it wasn't all based around books. After showing it to the class and talking to them about each part of the river in more detail, they were enthusiastic to create their own. They decided that they wanted it to be set as an extra homework task for the week.

As Julie McAdam et al concluded in their 2014 project Journeys from Images to Words, the idea 'increases awareness of what it means to read and can enable children to become more confident about the role literacy plays in their daily lives'. It certainly helped me to reflect on the range of reading I do each day as an adult but it also made me more aware of the different texts that my class and their families engage with. It's a simple, but useful way, for the children to connect their home and school reading, as well as providing teachers with a useful insight into the extended reading lives of their class.

Next week, some of the children are going to share their Reading Rivers during assembly and talk about their reading lives outside school. We're also planning to display some of them in the school library, as well as see if we can encourage any staff or parents to have a go at creating their own.

Friday, 2 December 2016

Year 6 Empathy Lab refugee work

Over the past 18 months, my school has been heavily involved in working with the Empathy Lab project, which uses books and reading as a starting point for children to help develop their empathy skills. It's having a noticeable impact on the way that many of our children think and act. This term, as part of our work, the Year 6 children have been focusing on the plight of refugees from different parts of the world.

We started by talking about what the class already knew about refugees, and then spent time reading and sharing a wide variety of books. Some, the pupils were already aware of (eg Boy Overboard by Morris Gleitzman, which we had read as a class story in Year 5), although they were looking at many of them for the first time. The books were added to a Pinterest board, which we updated as they discovered more, and put on the Empathy Lab Book Spotters website. Links to many of the books, along with some planning and resources that I've found are available on this Padlet page.

After a couple of weeks of reading and researching, we had a wonderful visit from an Amnesty International speaker, David Huband, who came to talk about human rights. The children discussed which rights they had and which rights they felt that refugee children might be denied. The class spent a lot of time discussing how and why children and their families travel from Syria to the UK.

As part of our Empathy Lab ‘social action’ work, the children decided to take part in Amnesty’s ‘Write for Rights’ campaign, and write letters to some of the refugees. They wrote about how people could make refugees feel welcome in the United Kingdom and what they enjoyed about living here. Because they were writing for a real audience, and could see that there was a genuine purpose behind their work, they were highly motivated to write and produced some fantastic work.

We also had a visit from a local refugee charity, GYROS, who shared the work they were doing in the Great Yarmouth area. One of the speakers was a refugee from Armenia and the other was a refugee from Mozambique, so they both had amazing stories to tell about their lives. The children were inspired by what they had been told and wanted to know how they could help. After Christmas, they've planned some fundraising acitivities but, equally importantly, they're going to do some work to raise awareness of the refugee situation in the local community.

Thoughts from Year 6
Troy: I actually feel as if I’d rather be the refugee than them so they didn’t have to suffer through things. I feel awful about what has happened.

Gracie: I tried really hard to empathise with them, but even with a vivid imagination like I have, it’s very hard to understand how bad things are.

Romy: When we read all the books about refugees, it made me think a lot about it. When someone says the word refugee it brings up loads of emotions as I didn’t know what they were going through before. Reading all the books helped me understand it.

Gracie: I loved how the books we read transported me to another world, but I hated the world that they transported me to!

Lauren: When you hear the stories about how hard it is, it makes you feel really lucky. I don’t like being separated from people I love for even a day, so just think what it would be like forever.

Romy: I feel upset for the refugees but I’m also angry at the people who are putting them through it. They’re just trying to have a normal life but they’re getting destroyed for no reason at all. Some of them are just little babies.

James: Writing the letters made me realise how many simple things I can do without being scared. I could just get a drink out of the fridge if I wanted to.

Lauren: It must be awful to go on a boat ride and not know what’s at the end of it. I know what’s going to happen every day and that makes me feel safe, but they don’t even know if they will survive to the next day.

Romy: When I wrote the letters, I felt lucky. I’m lucky anyway but I just felt lucky that I had the chance to make someone’s day a bit better. I know that when they get the letters they’ll realise that at least someone is thinking about them.

Gracie: Learning about refugees made me think about books like Once by Morris Gleitzman. The boy in that was a refugee too. All of those books made me understand what it must have been like to be hated in the war.

James: It made me ask my mum if we could send them stuff to help. We have lots of stuff that we don’t really need.

Troy: Some people in Yarmouth should treat the refugees kindly because, at the end of the day, we’re all humans.

James: I can’t imagine leaving everything at home. I’d have to leave my family, my pets, my books and my friends. I’d miss the village we live in. All my memories would be left behind. How could they take their memories with them? They must also miss speaking the language they know. They would just ‘feel’ their own language and to have to speak in another language all the time, well, that’s just like when I went to Holland.

Troy: It was probably some of my favourite work that we’ve ever done. We’re learning about the real world and we’re all part of it. Like, everyone, not just us and the people we know.

Wednesday, 23 November 2016

Mannequin Challenge

Never wanting to miss out on a potential bandwagon-jumping opportunity, last week my class had a go at recording their own Mannequin Challenge during quiet reading. We managed to nail it on the very first take!

Friday, 21 October 2016

Video trailers for books

We had a lot of fun in class this week creating video trailers for a few of our favourite books. It's an exciting way to get the children to collaborate and produce some ICT work based around reading. Because the amount of text that can be used is limited, it's important for them to select their words carefully and plan how to 'hook' the viewer, as well as think about what type of atmosphere they want to create.

Below is the video that we produced for the new book by Gareth P. Jones, The Thornthwaite Inheritance. The text and dialogue in the clip was based on the blurb of the book and on what we already knew about the characters. The whole process, including filming and editing, took about two hours. We put the video together using Movie Maker, and then uploaded it onto YouTube when we had finished.

Here is the video that we created for the 2013 Summer Reading Challenge.

We're also working on a trailer for John Dougherty's new Stinkbomb & Ketchup-Face book, which will hopefully be ready quite soon. There's currently a rumour flying around that Deer Class are going to be asked to make the official trailer for Star Wars Episode VIII...

Friday, 23 September 2016

Patron of Reading Conference 2016

Last weekend, the third Patron of Reading conference took place at the DoubleTree Hotel in Manchester. It was on a whole different level from the previous two that we'd organised. We even had sponsors (thank you MLS for all your support!) and a working sound system, which was a huge step in the right direction.

The line-up for the day was absolutely fantastic from start to finish. Speakers included authors The Two Steves, John Dougherty, Joffre White and SF Said; Miranda McKearney, OBE. from Empathy Lab; Marilyn Brocklehurst from Norfolk Children's Book Centre; Rob Smith, creator of the Literacy Shed; storyteller Marjorie Leithead and performance poet Tony Walsh. We also had wonderful contributions from librarians Mandy Wilson and Gill Ward; teacher John Bentham; organiser of the Haringey Chapter, Ian Coles from the Big Green Bookshop and Chris Lunt from MLS. The day was ably (??) compered by Patron of Reading founder, headteacher Tim Redgrave.

To find out more about the day, have a read of:

You can find a summary of the day's events by using the Twitter hashtag #PoRConf16. Also, here's the link to the MLS Reading for Pleasure video and the link to a video created by author Marcus Alexander. Marcus was supposed to be presenting on the day, but unfortunately he recently broke both his biceps on a piece of gymnastics equipment!

I'm delighted, and very proud, to be involved in such a great scheme. After talking to several authors, teachers and librarians on the day, it's clear that it's having a real impact on reading in schools across the UK. I believe that Tim is already making plans for #PoRConf17...