Reading promotion

Visibility of reading

Practical ideas

When establishing your reading culture, it is important to raise the visible profile of reading throughout the whole school. You can use visual displays to send out the following important messages about reading.

Reading is about enjoyment. Offer and display a breadth of reading materials such as magazines, newspapers, comics, fiction and non-fiction books, poetry and websites.

Reading is something that you can do anytime and anywhere. As well as developing storytelling corners in classrooms and decorating the corridors with reading displays, consider turning little nooks in the school into reading displays/corners, painting the toilet doors with famous characters from books (primary), or even develop a reading garden for the summer term.

Reading is something very individual. Personalise your reading displays and link in with the peer-to-peer recommendation systems that you have developed.

You can also demonstrate to visitors and parents the extent to which your school values reading through your visual displays. If there is a school website or newsletter, include a reading zone. Make sure that there are reading materials and reading recommendation displays in the school foyer. Use audio books as your telephone hold music.

And finally, the school library is the most visual reading display of all. Make your school library an attractive place to be and get everyone more involved in the school’s reading activities. Why not create your very own yellow brick road along the walls of the school corridors to the library?