National Literacy Trust #FitforLit Alternative Sports Day Challenge

 

With COVID-19 set to have a disastrous impact on the literacy of the 4.6 million children living in poverty in the UK, the National Literacy Trust is raising money to fund projects to support these children.

The #FITFORLIT Alternative Sports Day challenge invites you to film or photograph yourself doing something active with a book – maybe set up a book obstacle course, or see how many books you can weight-lift!

I decided to attempt to read out loud the first chapter of A Robot Ate My Grandma while out running! Watch the video below to find out how I got on.

 

Why not have a go yourself? Challenge three friends to join in too! Visit the Literacy Trust #FitforLit website for more info and ideas for how to get involved.

If you are able to donate a few pounds it would be much appreciated and a huge help to this important project. Please visit https://www.justgiving.com/campaign/fitforlit or text FITFORLIT to 70085 to donate £3 (texts cost £3 plus one standard rate message). Thank you!

Thanks for reading and watching the video of my pain! Have fun with your own #FitforLit challenge.

Take care and all the best, Dave.

My Favourite Football Books and other World Cup resources

Hi folks!

I'm sure you've already heard, but I believe there's a wee sport thing taking place this summer over in Russia. While football and reading may not be an obvious pairing, I've always held a place in my heart for both. So when my librarian friend George Kirk asked if I'd record a video recommending a few of my favourite football books I jumped at the chance. We're hoping that some of the football fans at George's school will be inspired to pick up a book to fill the gaps between matches! Anyway, I thought it was such a good idea, I decided to post the video in case anybody else found it useful. Watch it below or on my YouTube channel here.

On a similar theme, I finally found some time to make a Charlie Merrick's Misfits poster (see above) to add to my library display set. A3 and A4 sized posters in jpeg format can be downloaded here.

The Charlie Merrick 2018 WORLD CUP WALLCHART (above) is now also ready for download.

Finally . . . and I promise to wrap this up before we get dragged into extra-time and penalties . . . I've collected a few more links to various reading, writing and drawing resources that might be of interest in the current football crazy climate:

An 8 day scheme of work based on the Charlie Merrick football book is available on the TES website. (Please note - I had no involvement in the production of this resource, but I've been told by teachers that it's good. There's a small fee to download.)

The National Literacy Trust World Cup Kit Bag

The OUP Charlie Merrick Activity Pack, including design your own squad cards, comics and match sheet templates.

Finally my step-by-step guide to drawing a football action scene from the Guardian Children's Books website.

These and a few more links are also available via my website.

Thanks as always for your support. Have a great summer and enjoy the football!

Cheers for now,
Dave