Books, books, Books!
I’ve spent a lot of time over my career in education looking at books. I’ve looked for books on amazon. I’ve looked at examples of useful books that people post about on social media. In my early days, one of my favourite places to go looking for books was actually in garden centres. For some strange reason, and I genuinely can’t put a finger on what that strange reason was, my wife and I used to spend a Saturday afternoon heading to the local garden centre for a wander. It may have been around the time that we first bought a house and perhaps we were excited about the possibilities of ‘doing stuff to the garden’. But anyhow, whatever the reason was, as teachers, we both always ended up with a book in our hand that we were going to purchase. And the best thing about books in garden centres is that they tend to be discounted. I’m pretty sure they didn’t make much money out of selling books there, although they probably made a killing out of us!
One of my favourite books that I bought from a garden centre, was a book called Operation Itchy. Now I know what you’re going to say, and its definitely not what you think. I’ll explain the plot just to clear up any misconceptions. Operation Itchy is about an evil cat called Mad Manx. Now Mad Manx had a vendetta against the doggy world, and it was up to Agent Barker, a doggy detective who was tasked with investigating, to stop him. The itchy part comes in when it transpires that Mad Manx wants to unleash a hoard of ‘mega-fleas’ into the doggy world. Throughout the story, evidence is presented at different points alongside interviews with the local hotel manager Madame Pompom (yes – she was a poodle) and Boston Terry, a local taxi driver. Eventually, Agent Barker gets to the bottom of it all and discovers a pool of horrendous ‘mega-fleas’.
By this point, if you’re still reading, you are probably laughing and at the same time giving thanks to the fact that your son or daughter wasn’t taught by me using this book, but just hear me out a little longer. This book had a number of really cool features. For children, the story is funny and engaging and the characters bring it to life. There are also pop-ups and flaps that add a bit of mystery when new evidence is revealed. At the time, it also leant itself really well to a topic I was teaching. We were learning about spies and secret agents and it was perfect. I used it for my English lessons for two to three weeks and it was brilliant. I dressed up as Madame Pompom (yes – I wore a curly pink wig, which I do still have somewhere in the garage) and Boston Terry and got the children to use hot seating to interrogate the characters. When it came to the grand finale of the story, I had a crime scene set up at the front of my classroom with a huge pit of ‘mega-fleas’, and a safe to crack with a secret map to find the cure to the ‘mega-fleas’ should they be released. And do you know what, the children loved it! They were so engaged in what we were doing and produced some lovely pieces of writing as a result. It really was one of my favourite English units I have ever taught, however, I’ve never seen anyone rave about it on social media. I wouldn’t necessarily expect people to either– it doesn’t necessarily set the world on fire in terms of language. However, when I look at a book, I don’t just look at language. I look at the potential it has for bringing children’s imagination to life, which Operation Itchy did at an even greater level than I expected it would. Of course, if you are looking for a book to use as a model text, then language is really important. I just don’t think this is always the prime driver for a book choice. Sometimes the best learning comes from the images in a book or the idea of the book that can be developed brilliantly by the children.
Books in the curriculum
So my opinion is that books should be at the heart of the curriculum. And I think lots of people in education would agree with this. There are so many reasons why books are vitally important:
1. The importance of reading to developing children’s knowledge cannot be stated enough. The one thing that I have always asked the children I’ve taught to do, is read. Read, read, read. And the thing that children will always say is ‘But I’ve finished my book, sir’. Without fail, this is the response I’ll get from some of the children. But then I explain to them that if they read the page, chapter or book again, they’ll learn something new. They’ll be able to read it better and more fluently. As with anything, practice makes… well you know the rest.
2. Finding a great book can really inspire children with their writing. In order to support children with writing, they need two or three key things. They need something which sparks their interest and imagination. Choosing the right book (yes, like Operation Itchy for my Year 5s in 2010) can really engage and inspire children to write. You also need to model the writing, and that can either be you modelling from an inspirational picture book, or the book itself may provide a model that the children can see as an example. The other thing is scaffolds or structures to support, and again, if you’ve chosen a good book, these can be developed around that.
3. Developing knowledge across the curriculum. I want to talk more about this in a moment, but generally speaking, if you are teaching a topic, the children are going to be able to find out more information about that topic if you supply them with relevant books to that topic. And not just non-fiction books, but a range of books. Stories based on the theme, information books that are engaging, pop-up or lift the flap books, infographics which support reading and learning with images and symbols. Using books in this way helps to build your curriculum up and break down barriers for the children’s learning.
Developing links
For me, I have always tried to make links across the curriculum. These links, for the most part, have been led by books. I have developed topics around the books that I have discovered in my amazon searches and garden centre trips over the years. I’ve also searched for books to enhance the way I’ve planned topics and units of learning. I don’t think either way is right or wrong, both can work and it very much depends on the person doing it. What is clear to me, is that using books to make links, and having books at the centre of everything makes things better on all fronts. As a teacher, I know I’ve got good books around me for my subject knowledge, for supporting the children’s learning, for inspiring and engaging the children’s imagination. Without books, I don’t think I’d be the teacher that I am today, and I don’t think that the units of learning I have developed over the years would be as good as they have been. And the very best units I have developed, are those which all link together through the books that I have selected.
For this reason, my English teaching is often inspired by the history or geography topic I am teaching. And there are so many reasons for this: it gives the children greater opportunities to learn more about a topic, it provides context and purpose for writing, but it also provides regular opportunities to revisit learning. In the current world of education, where there is such a big emphasis on supporting children with knowing more and remembering more, we need as many opportunities for recall and retrieval of key knowledge as possible. Using books in this way, as the spine (excuse the pun) of the curriculum, enables all of these things. I have often seen discussions about choosing books because they relate to topics rather than being good books. And I agree, we shouldn’t just be using books for the sake of it. But in today’s world, where there are so many great books which are at our fingertips and available at the press of a button, you don’t have to look that hard to find great books that are relevant to the units of learning you are teaching.
Technology
Technology is an interesting aspect to this for me. Growing up, I wasn’t an avid reader. I occasionally read a book when I went on holiday with my family, but this was often because we were in a caravan and it was tipping it down with rain. Not a lot else to do. It was only when I became a teacher that I really began to invest myself in books (admittedly children’s books, probably because I’m a big kid at heart). The reason I say this, is because I would rather have played games on my PC or Gameboy (yes I’m that old), and I think we have even greater challenges today when it comes to competition. The number of children who prefer to play computer games or on apps on tablets, or even just going on YouTube and other social media platforms. There’s so much else out there for children to do, so how do we fight against this.
Some schools are embracing the technological side of things. I know schools that have supplied an iPad or other type of tablet for every child so that they can access things from home, complete homework and use it in lessons whenever needed. I think that it is okay to use these devices for reading too. There are so many ways of reading books on different apps, reading for research, listening to audiobooks - especially for developing an enjoyment of reading and stories for those children who perhaps struggle with their own fluency. Audiobooks can also be used to model fluency and expression. I say this with a small caveat though, and that is that I genuinely believe that we shouldn’t try and replace books with technology. Technology is important, it’s the thing that is developing the fastest in the world – you only have to look at current discussions around AI and its use within education and teaching to see that. But books are at least equally important if not more so. The experience of reading a book in real life rather than on a screen, and immersing yourself in the language and the illustrations. Having a favourite book that you keep for years. All of this is a big part of developing children’s love for reading, and in the current landscape, many children don’t have that genuine ‘love’ of reading. We have to find a way to get that back for the children we teach, because if they don’t have it, they won’t pass it on to the next generation of readers either.
I’m biased because I love using books so much. But what do you think?