Love of Reading
The Shadow Carnegie Award.
The Carnegies are the UK’s longest-running and best-loved children’s book awards.
A grand total of 119 books have been nominated for the 2025 Medals. 64 books are in contention for the Carnegie Medal for Writing, which is awarded to a book written in English for children and young people that sparks an outstanding reading experience, and 55 books for the Carnegie Medal for Illustration, which celebrates an outstanding reading experience through illustration. This includes 3 titles that have received nominations in both Medal categories.
In 2025 we have joined to be part of the Shadowers’ Choice Awards. This is voted for by children and young people who take part in the Awards shadowing scheme – a reading for pleasure initiative that engages thousands of children and young people in schools and libraries in the UK and overseas through ‘shadowing’ reading groups. Young people read and engage with the shortlists critically and creatively, through group participation and digitally: posting online reviews, artworks, videos, and taking part in creative activities and online events. Taking on the role of judges, the groups will vote for their favourite books to receive the Shadowers’ Choice Award at the winners’ ceremony in June 2025.
Reading Challenges.
Our ‘12 by 12’ and ‘13 by 13’ reading challenges not only encourage students to read regularly but challenge them to read a range of genres and authors, developing their love of reading across the literary canon. Each book has been carefully chosen to link to our schools CST values or British values, cementing cross-curricular links in reading.
Read, Review, Reward.
Our Read, Reward, Review incentive is open all year and encourages students to submit book reviews. Each book review is entered into a prize draw at the end of each term. It is a great way for students to share their reading experiences and help to inspire other readers.
Form time reading.
We promote our love of reading across the school during our weekly form time programme. At the start of the year, form groups vote on a book to read as a form. Form tutors read once a week with their form group, enjoying a shared social experience of reading that builds a sense of community and belonging. When form groups finish a book they can enter our Read, Review, Reward programme to earn points and swap for a new book to enjoy more reading together.
Reading lists.
Our reading lists have been collated by Curriculum leaders and teachers from across school. They are designed to provide wider reading opportunities linked to different subject areas and encourage students to engage with reading beyond the classroom. Each list includes a range of fiction and non-fiction texts, a range of genres and authors – there really is something for everyone!
