Throughout December, we delivered our largest Facebook Live series yet, led by our Home Learning Environment team in partnership with Macmillan Children’s Books.
Every day until Boxing Day, our staff members read a chapter from How Winston Delivered Christmas written by Alex T. Smith and published by Macmillan Children’s Book, guiding audiences of parents, carers and children aged 0-5 through fun, festive activities. These creative activities ranged from making snow globes, tree decorations to random acts of kindness!
The story of How Winston Delivered Christmas follows the journey of Winston the mouse on a very important mission. On Christmas Eve, he finds a letter that has been lost on its way to Father Christmas – so, with no time to lose, he sets out to deliver it himself in time for Christmas Day!
The festive Facebook Live take-over formed part of the #HungryLittleMinds campaign, a campaign led by us at the National Literacy Trust, funded by the Department for Education. The campaign works across 12 areas of the country to encourage parents and carers of children aged 0 to 5 to adopt positive behaviours and boost their children’s literacy development through chat, play and read activities.
Until 26 December, families tuned in to our Facebook page, to hear a new instalment from the book recorded by our staff members and external partners across our 15 Literacy Hubs across the country. On 1 December we were lucky to be joined by special guest and author of How Winston Delivered Christmas, Alex T. Smith, who introduced viewers to the story. For the final session, our Chief Executive Jonathan Douglas completed the festive take-over with a special message for all families and early years settings who got involved.
The home learning environment team are delighted with the feedback and figures as a result of the project. The series reached just over 29,000 families across the country, achieved over 200 likes and shares with more than 1,300 engagements on Facebook!
We would like to say a big thank you to all our colleagues who filmed a festive recording from the book, and to Macmillan Children’s Books for giving us permission to use the book as part of the activity, and finally to all of the families for joining in the festive fun!
Are you looking for chat, play and read activities?
If you are looking for chat, play and read activities to try with your little ones at home, visit our Words for Life website or sign up to our fortnightly newsletter.