The Summer Reading Challenge is a simple, yet extremely effective concept. Children are asked to read six books over the summer holidays and are rewarded with a medal for the books they have read, with many children reading more than the six needed to complete the challenge. Librarians are on hand to help the children with the challenge, and support their reading.
Since its launch in 1999, the Summer Reading Challenge has grown in size with 600,000 children taking part in 2007, under the theme ‘The Big Wild Read’. Over half of the children who participated completed the challenge.
Today 97 per cent of libraries across the nation support the Summer Reading Challenge. This year the theme is ‘Quest Seekers’, and is focused around the power of the imagination. It aims to unlock the wonder and magic of books, transporting readers into a distant world of words and new characters. It will also encourage children to visit libraries and see them as fascinating places where their imagination and creativity can roam free. Librarians can help children on their quest.
Children today face a myriad of competing distractions, particularly in the fight to cure the summer holiday boredom. Often reading for pleasure is not among them, and it is falling lower and lower on the list of children’s choices of activities. But unlike many of the others, reading is one activity that can dramatically affect a child’s educational success and life-long opportunities.
Sarah Osborne from the National Literacy Trust says, ‘Encouraging children to read can have a snowball effect throughout their lives. Getting them to read for enjoyment allows them to discover more books of their own interest and therefore makes reading more enjoyable for the child.
‘While reading they can develop various different aspects of their language skills, such as vocabulary and grammar, while enhancing their confidence, and that can transpire into better communication with others one-on-one and in large groups.’
In the long gap between the end of one school term and the start of another the need for children to read more is perhaps at its most crucial, as this is a time when progress some children make in school can come to a stuttering halt. This is something that Anne Sarrag, now consultant and adviser for the Summer Reading Challenge, believes is a worry for parents.
‘I think parents get quite hung up and feel very anxious about their children learning new words and enhancing their reading, which is why the Summer Reading Challenge is so good,’ she says. ‘It’s a experience that can be enjoyed and shared by children and their parents together.’
Besides, it’s a great way to get children into visiting the library, says David Kendall, father of five-year-old Vincent, who has participated in past challenges.
‘The challenge has really encouraged Vincent to think of libraries as a very exciting place to go,’ David says. ‘It makes him associate reading as a fun event not something he has to do.’
The challenge aims to build up children’s confidence in reading, showing them they don't need to be afraid of losing themselves in the world of literature. For children who struggle with reading in school, taking part in this challenge gives them the opportunity to enjoy books aside from the more formal and rigid learning which takes place in school – it can go a long way to creating a positive experience of books, which they may not always get in classrooms.
The scheme places education on the back burner and fun at the front, yet still enables children to get valuable learning benefits from participating.
For games, blogs, activities, jokes, quizzes and reading ideas to make summer fly – and general information about this year’s Summer Reading Challenge – visit teamread.co.uk
