On Thursday, 2nd of March students, schools and teachers throughout the region celebrated World Book Day.
Developing a love of reading
World Book Day is a UK charity that aims to change lives through a love of books and promote reading for pleasure, offering every child and young person the opportunity to have a book of their own.
The charity states:
“Reading for pleasure is the single biggest indicator of a child’s future success – more than their family circumstances, their parents’ educational background or their income. We want to see more children, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, with a life-long habit of reading for pleasure and the improved life chances this brings them.”
Last November, Primary School Library Alliance (PSLA) released a report findings that indicated that 1 in 7 state primary schools do not have a dedicated library space, impacting educational outcomes and the wellbeing of over 750,000 children in the UK.
While the South East had the lowest number of schools without libraries at 6%, the study found that the North East had the highest percentage of schools without a designated library area in England at 18%. The report linked this statistic to the North East as being a region with one of the lowest levels of children achieving expected levels in reading at Key Stage 1, Key Stage 2 and beyond.
World Book Day reported that over half a million children in England don’t own a single book. Part of World Book Day is offering book tokens and discounted books to students. In 2022, World Book Day saw the impact of this, stating that:
‘Over one in five (22.4%) pupils receiving free school meals said that the book they ‘bought’ with their World Book Day book token was the first book of their own.’
North East Schools Celebrate
Schools throughout the region took part in World Book Day wearing character costumes, gifting tokens, holding book themed baking competitions, meeting with authors and illustrators and even decorating potatoes.
Head Teacher of Lemington Riverside Primary School, Craig Heeley, commented:
“On World Book Day this year we are inviting all children to wear something cosy for a day of story telling and sharing our favourite books. We will also be joined by famous author Christina Gabbitas – Christina is author of the ‘Felicity Fly’ series of books as well as her books for older children called “No More Knives” and “No More County Lines”. Christina will be delivering workshops across the school for our children on World Book Day.”
Sandhill View Academy, part of the Aspire Learning Trust in Sunderland also took part. Joanne Maw, CEO of Aspire said:
“We love to celebrate World Book Day at Sandhill View as we recognise the importance of instilling a love of reading within our students. World Book Day is an important date on our school calendar as we relish the opportunity to share our love of books and our favourite stories with the students whilst also finding out which books they have enjoyed reading and studying the most. Many of our members of staff get into the World Book Day spirit by coming to school dressed as their favourite character from a story. This year, the English department dressed up as different characters from the Harry Potter books and the Maths department came to school as different characters from the Minions books. During break and lunch time students are able to visit the Learning Resource Centre to vote for their favourite staff WBD costume and visit the Book Swap Shop. Over the last couple of weeks both students and staff have donated books that they no longer read to the Book Swap Shop. On World Book Day students are able to visit the Book Swap Shop and take a book of their choice home to read. We love to hear the discussions the students have when choosing books and sharing their favourite ones with one another.””
Westfield School
Westfield School is an Independent Day School for Girls in Newcastle. All of Westfield Junior House pupils enjoyed a book-themed activity within their year groups which culminated in a celebration finale on Thursday.
Year 3 and 4 pupils had a ‘Blind date with a Book’ activity when they arrived in school and were presented with a wrapped mystery book. They then talked about their expectations from just looking at the front cover versus what they felt after reading a couple of chapters. Year 6 girls chose to design and create a hot air balloon based on the theme of their favourite book.
Laila chose ‘Ways to be me’ by Libby Scott and Rebecca Westcott and described how she could relate to the characters in the book. She said “I like lots of drama, so my hot air balloon is bright and bold”. Niamh chose ‘Boy at the back of the Class!’ and the passenger in her hot air balloon included a little girl, instead of the ‘boy’ in the title.
Westfield commented:
“World Book Day is a lovely opportunity to dress up in fancy character dress or non-uniform for the day and Westfield girls have enjoyed talking about and sharing their favourite books in their own unique and imaginative ways.”
NEAT schools get involved
Schools within the NEAT Academy Trust took part in the awareness day. Tyneview Primary, in Newcastle took part with paired reading across classes, dressing up as book characters, spending time in their Reading Shed, creating bookmarks and doing book-related tasks and creating a fun class challenge to ‘Read in a funny place’ with a photo and prizes. Benfield, a secondary school also in Newcastle, appointed Reading Ambassadors to promote reading for pleasure across the school and involved teachers as well as students by decorating classroom doors and sharing their favourite books.
Debi Bailey, CEO of NEAT commented:
“As a multi-academy trust with schools in areas of high socio-economic disadvantage, we know only too well the importance of reading. Education opens doors and within NEAT Academy Trust we believe passionately that all of our wonderful young people deserve the very best education. World book day is an opportunity for our school communities to come together and celebrate reading and stories. There are a number of exciting activities planned across the day including: potato book character, staff fancy dress, masked reader challenge, quizzes, whole school travelling story writing, reading bingo and much, much more. I can’t praise our staff and young people in our schools enough for the amazing efforts they go to, to bring learning to life!”
Chris Zarraga, Director of Schools North East commented:
“This week schools across the region celebrated World Book Day. Alongside World Book Day, this Thursday Schools North East gathered school leaders for our Curriculum Conference. Sean Harris, Trust Improvement Lead for Tees Valley Education, delivered a session about crafting a curriculum with poverty in mind and reminded us all that events like World Book Day can offer issues for those disadvantaged families who can’t stretch to buy a costume etc. As well as allowing for fun activities and a celebration of reading, the campaign provides a unique opportunity to get books into the hands of students who otherwise may not own a book, something that feels especially needed within the cost-of-living crisis.”
Lemington Riverside Primary School, NEAT Academy Trust and Westfield School are all part of our Schools North East Partner School/Trust Programmes. If you’d like to find out more about our Partner School Programme click here.
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