Bookshop Blurb by Rich Charlesworth

Now, more than ever, we need to celebrate and support independent children's bookshops. Rich Charlesworth, teacher, English Lead, children's book aficionado, UKLA regional representative, Empathy Lab judge and all-round inspiration has written about three of his favourites, explaining what they have to offer and why they're important to him. He can usually be found with a tea and a biscuit in one of the bookshops below, or on Twitter at @rcharlesworth.

The Alligator's Mouth Bookshop

The Alligator’s Mouth Bookshop in Richmond, SW London, is a welcoming sanctuary for children’s book fans. The name comes from a quote by Lemony Snicket:“A book is like an alligator's mouth – if you see one open you often end up disappearing inside”. Tony, Margaret and the team are children’s book enthusiasts through and through: they live and breathe books. I’m reminded of the bookseller in Shinsuke Yoshitake’s ‘The iWonder Bookstore’ in their ability to match the right book for the right customer. Full of recommendations which cover the whole gamut of text types (from non-fiction, poetry and picturebooks to graphic novels, Young Adult fiction and beyond), there’s always something to tempt you in.

Website: thealligatorsmouth.co.uk

Twitter: @alligatorsmouth

Round Table Books

Located in the beating heart of Brixton, this is a bookshop that prides itself on reflecting and inspiring the community that it’s based within. Round Table Books unequivocally celebrates underrepresented children’s books, writers and illustrators. The shop was originally set up as a one-week-only pop-up shop to mark publisher ‘Knights Of’ turning one. Thank goodness it decided to stick around! After a successful crowdfunding campaign, the store is here permanently and is the go-to place to pick up texts that showcase the wide range of experiences, emotions and lives of children around the UK and beyond. You may be lucky enough to find some signed copies and even spot a visiting author as Knights Of HQ is within the store.

Website: roundtablebooks.co.uk

Twitter: @BooksRound

Gosh! Comics

However tempting it is to begin this recommendation to visit this bookstore with an ‘OMG‘, I’m going to refrain from doing so. Visiting Gosh! is like someone turned your most frequently perused Comic and Graphic Novel bookshelves and fashioned them into a shop. Split over two floors in trendy Soho, Gosh! really has a huge variety of texts. They cater for every type of visual reader with stylish children’s books, graphic fiction and translated texts, alongside well-established runs / series. With staff recommendations adorning the window displays and tailor-made advice indoors, you can’t help but gush about Gosh!

Website: goshlondon.com

Twitter: @GoshComics

Three fantastic recommendations Rich, thank you so much! Even though the shops aren't currently open for customers to visit, they all offer a home delivery service via their websites so do please consider using them.

It would be great to hear about people's favourite children's bookshops across the UK so if you'd like to let us know why your local ones are so special, please get in touch.

Reading Buddies

Over the past few months, we've been thinking about ways to involve all our staff (meaning SLT, support staff and office staff, as well as teachers) in the development of our whole school reading culture. We've also talked about the significant number of children who don't have parental support with their reading at home and have decided that we'll attempt to help counter this by creating one-to-one pupil and staff reading buddies across the school.

We looked at our staffing structure and worked out that we had about 35 people available to become buddies, meaning that we could support three or four children per class (Y1-Y6). Each teacher then put forward their four most 'vulnerable' readers. The children selected weren't always necessarily the weakest readers, but those who weren't regularly read to at home, who had nobody outside school to talk with about books and stories or who needed someone to just show some interest in them as readers; basically, the children who might otherwise easily slip through the net. The teachers also included some information about why they considered them to be vulnerable, for example:

• Freddy has a general dislike of books. Doesn't engage at home and will do anything other than read during class reading times.
• Isla had previously been very interested in reading and used to want to share books that she'd read. However, she now refuses to read during school time and rarely reads at home. It would be good for her to be able to suggest books to someone as well as have books suggested to her.
• Joey isn't supported with reading at home, but is really interested in books and stories. Would be great paired with someone who is enthusiastic about books and would be happy to read him the occasional story.
• Liam finds it difficult to make it through a full book. He has suggested that he enjoys spooky stories, so perhaps he could be buddied with someone who enjoys this genre?

Once we had our list of children, we then looked carefully at which combinations we thought would work. For example, our Y4 teacher has a real love of graphic novels, so he was paired with a child who also enjoys them but doesn't have access to any at home. We also ensured that the adults were from different year groups to the children and weren't people with who the child already works on a regular basis, as we felt it was important for it to be a 'new' reading relationship for both parties. We then introduced the concept to the children, telling them who their reading buddy was and causing a great deal of excitement.

Before the first buddy sessions took place, we had a short meeting with staff. It was made clear that we knew it would be asking for (yet) another time commitment from staff but also talked how much impact it would potentially have and how much it would be appreciated by the children. We then examined how it might work in practice and shared ideas about how to keep the momentum going across the year. The ideas were then all recorded and shared with other staff (see below).

Staff-Pupil Reading Buddies

Thank you all for supporting this. If we can get it up and running across the school, it will provide an extra layer of support to our more vulnerable readers, the ones who need someone to read them stories, talk about books with, etc, and will also really help embed our reading culture across the whole school.

If you're able to meet with your buddy for about five minutes twice a week, that would be great, but don’t worry if you can only manage it once a week. There will be times when it won’t happen for different reasons, again don’t worry. I'm aware that it's asking for another time commitment from staff. This is genuinely appreciated, and will be appreciated even more by your buddies.

When you meet with your buddy will obviously depend on when you can find the time. It could be during break, lunch, at the end of assembly, just before school, etc. It’s important that the children take the lead in coming to find you. Obviously the children we’re focussing on are going to be the less enthusiastic and less engaged readers, so this might not be as easy as it sounds but please persevere. It doesn’t matter if you reward them the first few times for turning up, it needs to be something that they feel positive about, look forward to and want to be part of.

Suggestions (feel free to come up with your own)

Talk about their reading book- probably the most obvious! Are they enjoying it, what has been their favourite part so far, which other books does it remind them of, have they read anything else by the same author, are there any parts they don’t like, etc.

Talk about what you’re reading- bring it in to share (if appropriate!). Could be a book, magazine, football programme, etc. The message we need to try and get over is that all reading is good reading.

Ask them to share their class book- when they read it, why they look forward to it, who’s their favourite character, etc.

Reading histories- share the books you enjoyed as a child, why they were special, what you remember about them. Ask them about the books they can remember from when they were younger.

Poetry- share a poem, ask them about poems they enjoy, point them in the direction of a poet or poetry book.

Read them a page or two from a book, or find a short story that they would enjoy- lots of children on the list don’t get stories read to them at home and would absolutely thrive on the extra attention.

    

Although the initiative has only been running for a few weeks, there's already been a significant cultural shift across the school. The targeted children are, on the whole, showing far more positive attitudes to reading. There have been a couple of partnerships that haven't really taken off, for a variety of reasons, but these are very much in the minority. Children look forward to the sessions and make the effort to turn up. Some of them have brought in a favourite book from home to read and some have arrived with books that they've enjoyed and then recommended them to their adult buddy. This is all helping the school to develop a genuinely reciprocal reading community, which will ultimately increase the children's pleasure in reading (one of the key findings from the UKLA Teachers as Readers report).

The fact that virtually all the staff are involved means that there's more book talk around the school, with staff talking to each other about their buddies and asking for recommendations. Some members of staff who hadn't previously shown too much interest in reading are really enjoying the challenge and responsibility of the role. It's been wonderful to see staff visiting the library and searching out books and stories that they think their buddies would enjoy. We're going to review the idea in more detail next term but the early feedback so far has been very positive from both staff and children.

Class Reading Timeline

This year, I'm teaching the same class as I taught last year. In fact, I started at the school with this class when they were in the final term of Year 4 and they're now in Year 6. There are a couple of downsides to this (it's virtually impossible to come up with anything new to say at Parents' Evening that you haven't already mentioned in the previous five!), but there are also a huge number of positives. We've built up a wonderful shared reading history over the past two years, and I can confidently say that I know their individual reading habits inside out.

Earlier in the year we created individual and family reading histories, and the natural progression was to spend time working together to produce our class reading history or reading timeline. We started by talking about all the books that we'd read together and the shared reading experiences that we'd had. These included author visits from Paul Cookson, Matt Dickinson, Pippa Goodhart and Ali Sparkes, judging various book awards (Peters Book Of The Year and Royal Society Young People's Book Prize) and whole school celebrations of reading. We also looked through our class Twitter feed and at the various interactions we'd had with parents, authors, publishers, etc, about reading.

We then thought about which books or authors had created a big buzz and set off a reading 'chain reaction' around the room. In Year 4, everybody was reading the Stinkbomb and Ketchup-Face books by John Dougherty. In Year 5 it was all about the Cirque du Freak series by Darren Shan and, so far in Year 6, the most popular books have been the Once family by Morris Gleitzman (he doesn't like to call them a series apparently) and Wonder by RJ Palacio. There's also been a real surge of interest in reading graphic novels this year, caused by one of the pupils enjoying Smile by Raina Telgemeier and then getting all of her friends to read it.

  

The class split into small groups and planned how they were going display their timeline. Most went with using a long piece of wallpaper and photographs alongside written thoughts and reflections, although one group very keen to produce a PowerPoint. It took a couple of afternoons, but we were all were absolutely delighted with how they turned out. Each group took their finished reading timelines round to show the some of the other classes, and they're all currently on display in the school library.

In terms of impact in the classroom, one of the recommendations from the UKLA Teachers as Readers report was to develop pedagogy which fosters 'inside text talk' (spontaneous, informal and child led) about reading and books, and which supports children in creating 'positive reading identities'. The conversations that took place about books, authors and reading between the groups were an absolute joy to be part of. When you overhear a child explaining to an engrossed group of friends the similarities and differences between The Goldfish Boy by Lisa Thompson and The London Eye Mystery by Siobhan Dowd, then you know it's been time well spent.

Patron of Reading update

Last month I wrote a short article for the UKLA Primary 4-11 magazine about the growth of the Patron of Reading initiative across the UK. Some of that article appears below.

The Patron of Reading initiative continues to flourish in schools across the United Kingdom. Since it was last mentioned in this magazine (Summer 2014), it has grown from approximately 50 schools to more than 150. For those currently unaware of the initiative, a Patron of Reading is a school’s special designated author (or poet, illustrator or storyteller) with whom they develop a relationship over a period of time. As well as all the usual benefits to a school from organising an author visit, working with a Patron can offer whole lot more.

John Dougherty, author of the Stinkbomb & Ketchup-Face series and Patron of Reading at West Earlham Junior School since 2013, said:

I love visiting schools, and invariably get a great response from the kids; but there’s something different about visiting my Patron of Reading school. I think it’s the sense of connection - even of ownership - that the children feel with me and my work. And I can do things that I don’t normally do on school visits - drop-in visits to classrooms for a bit of a chat about books; assemblies where we challenge and explore preconceptions about reading; even talking shops with parents - where we can get stuck right in, without any need for warm-up or introduction.

Tim Redgrave, headteacher of Ysgol Esgob Morgan in North Wales and the person behind the original idea, reported:

Having a personal link to a ‘famous’ person has helped make reading cool at our school. The interaction is a very personal link between the child and the author. It's opened up a new world of literature for our pupils who now read for pleasure so much more. We’ve had 100% completion of the Summer Reading Challenge three years on the bounce, and have extended the library once and need to do so again! All from having a Patron of Reading!

The second Patron of Reading conference took place in London earlier this year and was attended by almost 100 authors, poets, librarians and teachers. Speakers included Alan MacDonald, author of the Dirty Bertie books, who spoke passionately about the importance of schools with authors; Josh Seigal, who talked about how being a performance poet helped him in his patron role and Gillian Cross, author of Carnegie Medal winner Wolf, who shared her experiences of being a patron at more than one school. There were many other speakers throughout the day and a full write-up of the day can be found on the Patron of Reading website.

Ways that schools and patrons can support each other by sharing good practice have been discussed several times over the past year. Ian Coles, representing Big Green Bookshop Education CIC , has recently helped create the first local ‘chapter’ of patrons in Haringey:

We asked to set up the first regional chapter because schools were always asking the Big Green Bookshop to arrange author visits and we knew there was already significant support for the scheme across the borough.
We began by inviting existing patrons to join the cluster and then brokered some additional partnerships and held a launch event in partnership with the library service. The response from schools and authors has been fantastic, with many new partnerships to be announced in the autumn, and schools queuing up for patrons. We are beginning to create opportunities for patrons to share ideas and successes - showcasing activity on our website and encouraging authors to tag Patron of Reading activities on their social media. We are also building our understanding of the barriers to participation for some schools - and exploring exciting ideas such as shared patrons and patrons in branch libraries.
The best thing so far has been the sheer volume of goodwill towards this initiative (which Big Green Bookshop Education has undertaken to support for at least 3 years). Schools, authors, storytellers, community organisations, other bookshops: so many people are supporting us (not forgetting Big Green Bookshop customers who have generously donated money and help). It's early days for us yet but it's up to us all to make this something really special.

The Patron of Reading initiative has also recently started to forge links with Empathy Lab, a new venture from Miranda McKearney OBE, founder of The Reading Agency. Empathy Lab is researching into how a more focused use of stories and books can help children build the foundational skill of empathy, and is beginning to trial their empathy education approach with a small group of schools from September 2015. Miranda says of the Patron of Reading/Empathy Lab partnership:
Wouldn't it be amazing if every single child was putting into practice the empathy skills to respect, value and care for themselves, other people and the world? We're inspired by the power of empathy to make the world a better place, and the power of stories to build empathy.
Liaising with writer Helena Pielichaty, we have begun testing some of our thinking with the Patron of Reading initiative, a wonderful grassroots organisation, which places authors in schools as champions of reading.
We see authors as a powerful catalyst in a drive to help children develop empathy. To create compelling characters, writers use empathy in spades; they're empathy experts. We hope to build an army of authors helping lead a movement to connect literacy and reading for pleasure more closely with social and emotional education.  As part of this we are planning to start working with several Patron of Reading schools in the very near future.

As the initiative has been up and running for almost four years, several patrons are now coming to the end of their tenure in schools. Fortismere School in Haringey was one of the very first schools to adopt a patron, Sita Brahamachari, author of Artichoke Hearts, in 2012. In September 2015, Sita is handing over the baton to SF Said, the creator of the Varjak Paw series. Gill Ward, the librarian at Fortismere, gives her view as to why the initiative has been so successful:

The Patron of Reading scheme has worked brilliantly for us; it's wonderful for the students to have their own, dedicated author and to be able to build up a connection with them. Sita inspired many of our students to explore the world of books and even some of our reluctant readers are discovering themselves in books. The great thing about the scheme is that it has allowed Fortismere and Sita to build our own special relationship and way of working. I'm now super-excited and looking forward to working with SF; it's going to be so interesting to see where our Patron of Reading journey will take us next.

SF Said, a passionate advocate of reading for pleasure in schools, added:

I've always believed that reading for pleasure has the power to change people's lives. I'm honoured and thrilled to be Fortismere School's new Patron of Reading. Just seeing the superb school library and hearing librarian Gillian Ward's passion for books, I feel sure that Fortismere children have access to the very best resources. I'm looking forward to inspiring the children to make the most of them, and building on the brilliant work done by Sita.

Why has the Patron of Reading idea been so successful in schools? Michael Rosen, the keynote speaker at the recent launch of the Haringey chapter, summed it up when he said that it was a grassroots initiative, owned directly by schools and writers, for the benefit of children and young people, in direct contrast to many ‘top-down’ interventions and organisations. As the creator of the Patron of Reading website, I am always genuinely delighted when I am contacted by a school who talk about wanting to create a ‘genuine’ or ‘real’ reading culture, and whether there are writers available to become patrons. I am also equally delighted when I am contacted by a writer who has heard from their peers about the impact that having a Patron of Reading can have on children’s attitude to reading.

If there are any schools or colleges who are interested in getting involved, please visit the website - your Patron of Reading is waiting!

www.patronofreading.co.uk