This year, Manor Junior School will be participating in the National Year of Reading. In 2026, a national spotlight is being put on reading and on the simplest way to help children enjoy it: connecting it to what they already love.

For families, the National Year of Reading also means more support, more ideas and more opportunities to weave reading into busy routines, whatever age your child is.

Monthly Challenge

The theme for the National Year of Reading is GO ALL IN.

Each month, we will be setting a simple, fun challenge for all children to join in with. Participation will be celebrated at school, on our website and in our newsletters. Children who really GO ALL IN will be in with the chance of winning some prizes at the end of this school year.

Entries can be given or emailed to Mrs James: h.james@manor-junior.hants.sch.uk with the subject line NYR entry. Please make sure that you include your child’s full name and class with their entry.

Thank you for getting involved

We really appreciate any way in which you can help us to GO ALL IN with reading this year.

As well as hoping that children enjoy the immediate benefits of reading, reading for pleasure early in childhood is also linked to better cognitive performance and mental wellbeing in adolescence (https://readingagency.org.uk/our-work/our-research/reading-facts/).

Together, we hope to inspire a lifelong love of reading in all of our children.

There is more information on how you can get involved at home here: https://goallin.org.uk/get-involved/families/

January Challenge: Take a photo of a great reading spot at home. If you haven’t got one, can you create one? You could create a reading den…

February Challenge: Share a bedtime story with someone at home. You could read, or be read to – it doesn’t matter! It also doesn’t matter what you read. It could be a book from the school library, or something from home. Maybe you could share a story that you used to enjoy when you were younger. If you can’t find a story to share, try one on www.storyberries.com

If you would like to know more about the incredible proven benefits of sharing bedtime stories, there is more information here: https://www.starchildstories.com/blog/bedtime-stories-science. For example, did you know that the hippocampus in the brain works overtime during storytelling, forming both explicit memories (the story details) and implicit memories (emotional associations with reading and learning)?

There are lots of tips on the above website for sharing stories with your child. My top choice is the section linked to emotional presence:

1. Put away devices and distractions

2. Focus fully on your child

3. Use expressive voices and gestures

4. Cuddle and maintain physical closeness

If nothing else, this special time together sharing stories with your child, no matter how old they are or how confident they may be at reading, is the true magic of storytelling.

March Challenge: Doodle all the things that make reading fun for you. Think about what you're reading, how you're reading it, where you are, what you're eating, what you're listening to.

April Challenge: Draw a picture of a character or place from a story. How do you imagine it looks? Can you use a description or picture from the book to help you? If you prefer writing to drawing, then you could write your own description of the character or setting instead.

May Challenge: This is a slightly more adventurous one, as you might find yourself somewhere unusual, or doing something different to normal, over the May half term holiday… May’s challenge is EXTREME READING! You are challenged to read in the most unusual place you can think of. The more creative, the better! We would love for families to get involved as well so please feel free to join in. Children are reminded that they must ask for an adult’s help with this to make sure that they are safe.

June Challenge: Look up the lyrics of a song you love. You can send me a copy of the lyrics, or just let me know the song and artist name. If you can, let me know: What do you like about the song? What do the lyrics mean to you? Which is your favourite line and why? 

I love ‘Something Inside So Strong’ by Labi Siffre. It is all about being strong and brave in the face of adversity, negativity or unkindness. My favourite line is “When they insist we're just not good enough, well we know better – just look him in his eyes and say ‘we're gonna do it anyway’.” This line reminds me of what we have talked about in school about being brave when things get difficult.

Remember, reading song lyrics is still reading and we want you to read what you love! There are suggestions of books for music lovers here: https://goallin.org.uk/music/

As we only have a few weeks left of term, there will be no new challenge for the National Year of Reading for July.

This gives you a chance to catch up on some of the challenges that you might have missed so far! Please do go back and have a go at any of the monthly challenges that we have set this year. 

The deadline for completing challenges and getting them to Mrs James is Friday 10th July. I will then be looking at who has participated the most this year and handing out prizes to them before the end of term. I have some lovely prizes from our recent Book Fair!

Entries can be given or emailed to Mrs James: h.james@manor-junior.hants.sch.uk with the subject line NYR entry. Please make sure that you include your full name and class with your entry.

Happy reading!