It’s ages since my last reading news update, and there’s lots to catch up with. What a lovely picture to illustrate it all: the fabulous year 1 reading jungle in Undy School Monmouthshire.
First, an important campaign to get all 11 year-olds reading well by 2025. There’s useful background data in The Reading Lives of 8 to 11 year-olds 2005-2013.
Other new research tells us:
- Many of the genes that affect how well a child can read have an impact on their maths skills too.
- Children who have strong reading skills and more intelligent by their mid-teens.
- Films based on children’s and teenage books greatly increase readership.
- Print books are far more popular than digital with 16-24 year olds.
- Children are more likely to follow instructions if they are written.
All these recent articles are well worth checking out:
- School librarian and reading guru Adam Lancaster has written a useful piece on the successful reading brain.
- Neill Cameron has started a series of blogs on the importance of comics for literacy.
- Jon Scieszka informs us that if we want children to read we should stop telling them how important it is.
- Unsuited to Age Group is an interesting discussion of whether there should be limits on sexual or violent content in children’s and literature.
- Nicola Davies urges us to rethink children’s non-fiction.
- Michael Rosen has a useful set of tips on helping children’s comprehension.
There have been many calls recently for more inclusive children’s books. An event intended to turn discussion into action has just been announced.
Finally, there are some great books on the UKLA Book Award longlists.
