Blog

To celebrate National Poetry Day, our Young Writers Programme Manager, Fay Lant, shares some of her favourite poems created by the young people she has worked with this year.Passing tests is important but if we were to choose the two...

Could music hold the key for laying strong foundations for literacy in early years?This is a sponsored post.· How are neuroscience studies investigating the ‘musician’s advantage’?· How does neuroscientific evidence indicate that music...

Our Director, Jonathan Douglas, explains what our new research shows.We’ve long known that a love of reading and writing can help children flourish at school and go on to succeed at work. But we now know that reading and writing for...

Tilly Brooke, Director of School Engagement & Marketing at now>press>play, explains how audio learning can improve engagement in the classroom.Today’s world is full of images and screen time, and so much of this is wonderful...

Explain, explore, evaluate: we know that as extended writing becomes integral to more and more GCSE subjects the profile of literacy across the curriculum has been raised, but the nuances of a command word, even the concept, can still...

The new host of BBC Radio 1 Breakfast, Greg James, and Newsbeat presenter Chris Smith chat to our director Jonathan Douglas about becoming children’s authors, storytelling and the world of Kid Normal.Jonathan Douglas: Tell us how it...

Polina Lyadnova, Natalie Farmer and Byron Spring from Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton explain how the company is introducing sixth-form students to deal-making…On Tuesday 3 July, Cleary Gottlieb teamed with volunteers from TPG,...

Man Booker Prize-nominated author Wyl Menmuir explains the powerful impact author visits to schools can have on children.I remember vividly meeting my first author. It was at my local library. I was eight and the writer was Robert...

Geetha Sundar, Head of Computer Science/ICT at St Michael’s Catholic School in High Wycombe , explains how she’s tackling fake news in her classroom…Social, moral, spiritual and cultural (SMSC) issues are covered in ICT and computer...

Hannah Jenkins, English teacher at Maesteg School in Wales, explains how she’s tackling fake news in her classroom…“Miss, did you know World War 3 is going to start this week?”“Sylvester Stallone died this morning.”“School is closed...

Children and young people today are growing up in a globalised world. The rise of digital and social media is transforming their experience of news and demanding them to process information from a wider variety of sources than...

School libraries have the power to positively impact the development of empathy in children, says our Programme Manager Victoria Dilly.School libraries have the power to positively impact the development of empathy in children and young...

Our Sport and Literacy Programme Manager Jim Sells explains how football can motivate children to improve their literacy.Football has always been a big part of my life so I count myself lucky that I’ve been able to combine my love of...

Whether you teach PE, science, history or geography, you will need to get to grips with the literacy requirements of the new GCSE specifications.Whether you teach PE, science, history or geography, you will need to get to grips with the...

Copyright and plagiarism can be difficult concepts for children to get to grips with, but it’s vital that they understand them. Alice Donovan of the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) explains why…In this digital age where...

Dermot O’Leary, broadcaster and author of Toto the Ninja Cat and the Great Snake Escape, talks to our Director Jonathan about his books, how he writes, his reading habits as a child and more.Jonathan Douglas: Did you get many books at...

How much could a targeted reading intervention improve attainment? Dr. Janet Vousden from Coventry University explains…Decades of research have revealed the core skills required to become a good reader: decoding the print on the page,...

Business publisher LID Publishing explains how the company will be fulfilling the Business Pledge in 2018Business publisher is one of the new signatories for the 2018 Vision for Literacy Business Pledge. Leading businesses have...

How important are school libraries to children and young people? Victoria Dilly, manager of our Love our Libraries programme, believes they are crucial for children’s social, emotional and academic development.Having been a school...

What contributes to the variation in children’s language development in the early years?By Padraic Monaghan, Professor of Cognition in the Department of Psychology at Lancaster University, co-director of the ESRC International Centre...

Our friends at Dundee Council explain how they use National Literacy Trust membership for every state school in their local authority.Up here in sunny Dundee (that is a fact by the way — we are the sunniest city in Scotland!), all of...