Literacy news
Get your World Cup (tool)kit on in time for the big kick-off
10 May 2010
With the first game of the Football World Cup in South Africa kicking off on 11 June, the countdown is on and World Cup obsession is set to hit fever pitch. To make the most of the excitement, the National Literacy Trust and children’s author Tom Palmer with support from the Football Association, have developed a free World Cup resource to inspire young people’s reading.
The resource, Love Football: Love Reading, funded by the Football Foundation and the Professional Footballers’ Association, is a toolkit for literacy professionals and features ideas and activities that schools, libraries and learning centres at football clubs can use to promote reading through sport. Following on from recent National Literacy Trust research* of 17,089 pupils, which found that one-third of boys (32.3%) can’t find books to read that interest them, the toolkit aims to tap into young people’s, and especially boys’, love of the ‘beautiful game’. Many of the ideas have been inspired by the National Literacy Trust’s football reader development initiative Reading The Game, along with activities that link with Tom’s Foul Play football detective series.
Ideas featured in the toolkit include: a library football treasure hunt to make families aware of the different football reading material available; advice about launching an activity called ‘Male Order’ where parents, especially mums, are encouraged to borrow or buy World Cup books for men and boys in their household; and a guide to putting together an interactive World Cup display.
Tom is going to write a free episodic story called Foul Play: The World Cup Mystery as part of the initiative. The instalments will be published online from 8 June and will feature Danny Harte, his football detective character. Based around the tournament and responding to daily events and results the instalments will be uploaded ready for teachers to read aloud to their class from 6am each school morning from 8 June to 13 July. The very first instalment can be found at the back of the World Cup toolkit.
You can download the Love Football: Love Reading World Cup toolkit here.
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