A drive to encourage more pupils to pick up books and improve their literacy levels has been hailed a success with teachers actively promoting reading across the curriculum.
Daryl Lowe, the librarian at The Bemrose School, in Uttoxeter New Road, has been working with teachers in the maths, humanities and science departments to push literacy through every subject.
By creating challenges and competitions, with prizes including an e-Book, children have improved their vocabulary, increased their reading stamina and seen a rise in their academic understanding.
More books have been taken out of the library than ever before and children are accessing a broader range of reading material than they did previously.
And in some year groups the numbers of children borrowing books exceeds the national average. In year seven 1,181 books have been taken out since September, which equates to 5.2 books per student.
Mrs Lowe said: “As a school we have always worked hard to develop a reading culture, but that is normally in tandem with the English department or the staff in the primary phase, rather than in other subject areas. But reading is pervasive in life and so it should pervade the curriculum too.
“Now the school has a literacy lead in every subject and they are each developing ways to guide and implement reading strategies that relate to individual subjects and topics.
“By developing students reading skills, both for purpose and pleasure, we can give them the very best chance to succeed, both at school and in life.”
Research has found that pupils who read around their subjects gain a more rounded knowledge of a topic, rather than a surface-level understanding.
The humanities department is running a reading genre challenge to encourage keystage three pupils to read around history, RE and geography topics. The librarian keeps records and prizes will be given out at the end of term for those pupils who have completed the challenge.
The Science literacy lead has taken a different approach to promote literacy by producing written articles and getting the students to answer in-depth questions about the texts.
Mrs Lowe added: “In the library, we are always running literacy challenges, competitions and activities – of course we celebrate World Book Day but celebrating reading for pleasure echoes around Bemrose throughout the year.
“The students who complete the tasks will be entered into a prize draw each half-term and the prize is an eBook worth more than £70. This has created a frenzy of excitement, especially with the year seven students.
“We are really lucky that our school has a well-equipped library with a wealth of material to suit all kinds of reading levels and interests. As a librarian it has been a joy to see more and more children reading more widely.”
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