Reading for Pleasure

Reading is an essential skill, not just for school, but for life. School libraries assist the development of reading in a huge range of ways. From providing resources for disciplinary reading around curriculum subjects to Book Groups with book talk and discussions of carefully chosen titles to allowing free choice from a curated collection tailored to the needs of your school community the school library is a vital whole school resource.

Learn more about reading in schools, and what's currently going on here. 

Why read for pleasure?

“Reading for pleasure is more important for children’s educational success than their family’s socio-economic status.”

- Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Reading for Change, Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 

Teenagers who read in their spare time know 26% more words than those who never read, according to UCL Institute of Education (IOE) researchers at the Centre for Longitudinal Studies (CLS). 

- UCL

Children who are the most engaged with literacy are three times more likely to have higher levels of mental wellbeing than children who are the least engaged.

National Literacy Trust

"A deep engagement with storytelling and great literature link directly to emotional development in primary children.”     

- The Rose Review, 2008 Independent Review of the Primary School Curriculum

“Leisure reading makes students more articulate, develops higher order reasoning, and promotes critical thinking.”

- National Endowment for the Arts in To Read or Not to Read, 2007

"Reading has cognitive consequences that extend beyond its immediate task of lifting meaning from a particular passage. Furthermore these consequences are reciprocal and exponential”

- Cunningham and Stanovich, NEA, 2007;68 in Howard, 2011:47

How does the SLA support?

We keep up to date with children's literature;  and are experts in how to create a reading culture and maximising a school library. Most of our resources are for members, but everyone can access our Meet the Creator sessions on our YouTube channel. There's one primary and one secondary every month, and we seek to raise the profile of under represented creators, characters and topics. Watch them here. 

 

Get Everyone Reading

When implemented properly a reading culture is naturally inclusive. Become a free member and gain access to our free, downloadable guide to creating a reading culture, Get Everyone Reading. 

With top tips, organsiations who support and solid advice from Alec Williams this is a solid starting point for anyone trying to build a reading culture in a school. 

How do we know if it's for pleasure?

You can know this by measuring a child's attitude to reading. We've worked with BounceTogether to create an easy online survey on Attitude to Reading, as part of Wellbeing Through Reading.

This will allow you to identify those children who don't read for pleasure, advocate for and maximise the school library.

Support us

As a charity, our focus is on helping those that need it. But that means we need your help too. Whether it's volunteering, fundraising or donations, it makes a huge difference to the number of pupils we're able to support. 

Training

The School Library Association offers a wide range of on demand and real time training to enhance the personal and professional development of everyone who works in school libraries.

  

Support our awards

We run various awards that celebrate the people, projects and partnerships that make school libraries great. They are an important way of telling positive stories about school libraries and rely heavily on external support, whether it be sponsorship, prizes, or spreading the word. 

 

Learn more