At Elmstead Wood Primary School we are continuing our drive to encourage more children to read for pleasure. We launched our brand new school library in July 2018 to promote the love of reading and each classroom has a dedicated reading area. In both spaces, children can choose books to read in school and to take home.  Clear expectations for reading at home are set in each year group and Reading Records are monitored to track this.

Research shows a positive link between reading frequency, enjoyment and educational attainment.  Furthermore, reading for pleasure has positive emotional and social benefits, improves text comprehension and grammar skills and increases general knowledge.  We have many initiatives that will be taking place in school over this academic year to encourage reading for pleasure.

• Daily Drop Everything and Read
• Playground Reading Hut
• Book Week
• Competitions
• Sponsored reads
• School library open during lunchtimes
• Weekly allocated session in school library for all classes
• Author and Poet visits
• 'Sleepover' event
• Whole school reading rewards (with a chance to win a Kindle Fire each term)

Things you can do at home:

• Ensure your child reads at least 3 times per week for a minimum of 20 minutes and record their reading in their Reading Record.
• Talk about what books they are currently reading.
• Ask questions when listening to your child read aloud 
• Read books to your child / read books together.
• Visit local libraries and bookshops.

Stuck for what to read?

If your child is finding it difficult to know what they want to read, here are some ideas:

• See our recommended reading lists
• Register on the  CLPE’s Core Books CLPE’s Core Books website for free to view regularly updated book lists sorted by age-range, genre, author or publisher.
• Visit Accelerated Reader Bookfinder which is an easy to use, free online tool which allows you or your child to search for books by interest-level and topic.  You can also find collections lists of the most popular books that children are reading at the moment.

We greatly appreciate all the support you give in supporting and encouraging your children to read at home and we are looking forward to an exciting year full of reading ahead!