How do we even begin to explain the importance of reading? And how indeed can we get our key message across about how we teach reading, (and more importantly perhaps) how we can help you to help your children become lifelong readers and lovers of great stories- before you get bored reading this and scroll to a different section, or even worse log off!

So we won’t go on too much by telling you that reading ability and engagement with reading make a big difference (a whopping big difference!) to how well your child will do at school and how well they will fair in the world of work in years to come. We won’t drone on here about phonics and technical stuff (we’ll save that for the correct time- a meeting when we will explain all that ‘teacherly’ stuff) But let’s just keep those thoughts in mind as you read on.

There is no doubt that stories are a big part of everyone’s lives. Lots of us can probably remember meeting Little red Riding Hood, The Three Little pigs and Cinderella (or at least someone else they hang out with in storyland- like Humpty Dumpty, Fungus the Bogey Man, Mrs Wobble the waitress or our dear old friends Biff and Chip) at some point in our childhood. Perhaps you might have nodded at Mr Gumpy, walking Spot the Dog round Percy the Park keeper’s park, seen Jack scrambling down the Beanstalk or wondered about Mog and the baby or worried about the Gruffalo’s child. And if you've never “Loved someone to the Moon and back”, where have you been!?

When they get bigger we’ll laugh along to Captain Underpants’ capers, hang on every word that Michael Morpurgo writes, visit the magical worlds inhabited by Harry Potter and Hermione Grainger, join Gollum and walk in his steps through the tunnels of The Magisterium. We will cry at the exploits of Tracey Beaker. We will explore new places, meet strange people travel backwards and forwards through time and get ourselves into and out of the most unimaginable situations on earth, underwater and in outer space. We will walk with dragons and fairies, talking animals, ghosts and ghouls, evil genius’s and complete fools…in short we will journey our world and beyond forever and ever and ever.

Perhaps the most important thing we can all do then is to make sure that we make time for reading. That we set aside time to share a story, that we read aloud, that we listen to and encourage,  that we challenge and we support.  On top of that we should always put on the funny voices, always take it in turns, always wonder what if and why. Always discuss the what next and the where to, always speculate about the with whom and when…… and never stop doing so.

We believe that in adopting this attitude towards reading, writing and sharing stories and precious time together, (or one very much like it) that the children we care about will go out into the world as intelligent, informed and interesting people carrying with them the key to  almost everything.