The old adage tells us that ‘a journey of 1000 miles starts with a single step’. Developing this idea, the first step to a lifetime of reading for purpose and for pleasure starts during our time at school.
Our school sits in an area of high disadvantage, with eight of the ten most deprived neighbourhoods in England right on our doorstep. Through conversations with pupils, parents, and between staff, we recognised that our pupils simply didn’t read enough, and needed support in taking steps along their reading journey. For a variety of reasons, many pupils had limited engagement with reading outside of school, but it alarmed us to realise that – outside of English lessons – their in-school experience wasn’t much better. While changing reading habits at home is challenging, we decided to focus on what was within our gift – to change the reading experience pupils had while in the school building.
We decided to focus on two key areas:
- developing a culture of reading through the introduction of a ‘literary canon’
- developing disciplinary reading across the school
