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Literacy teaching and school events calendar 2023-2024-2025

Added 04 Apr 2024 | Updated 12 Apr 24

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Ideas and literacy teaching resources for cultural events and UK awareness days

We support schools and early years settings with literacy teaching resources to help enrich your lessons as you mark special days throughout the academic year.

Our evidence-based and curriculum-linked educational resources build on key literacy and cutural moments in the school calendar to help you support positive engagement with reading, writing, speaking and listening.

Resources support teaching and learning across a broad age range covering early years, primary and secondary (including early years, KS1, KS2, KS3, with some extending to KS4 and KS5, and in Scotland early level through first, second, and third/fourth level to senior phase).

Where relevant, we work with expert partners to ensure that we embed inclusion, celebrate diversity and address challenging topics with sensitivity.

Plan your literacy year

Use our calendar ideas below to draw up your own literacy teaching plan for the term or year ahead, and explore the teaching resources provided to help you.

More support

  • We'll continue to update this page throughout the year.
  • Get regular updates in our Resources and Training newsletter.
  • Premium whole-school membership subscribers - our printable year planner (primary and secondary versions) provides a handy month-by-month listing of moments for which we'll be developing resources or events. Display the planner in your staffroom or use it for team planning.
  • Discover our CPD courses running throughout the year and find more information about conferences, training and workshops for teachers and practitioners.

Events in the Summer Term 2024 calendar

April 2024

Earth Day

May 2024

Year 6 SATS

June 2024

Empathy Day

National Writing Day

Refugee Week

Pride Month

July 2024

Transition preparation

National Secondary School Conference

  • Date: 1 July 2024
  • Join us in Salford, Greater Manchester for our Oracy Matters secondary conference featuring keynote speakers Emeritus Professor Neil Mercer and TS Eliot prize-winning poet Joelle Taylor, plus an exciting range of workshops.
  • Secondary school conference: Oracy Matters

Events in the Autumn Term 2024 calendar

September 2024

Back to school and settling in

October 2024

Black History Month

Libraries Week

National Poetry Day

  • Date: 3 October 2024
  • A whole-school/setting opportunity to encourage children to make, experience, share and enjoy poetry.
  • National Poetry Day resources (Early Years, plus Key Stages 1, 2 and 3)

World Mental Health Day

  • Date: 10 October 2024
  • Promote reading as an effective way of helping people take care of their mental health and wellbeing.
  • Take 10 to read

Halloween

  • Date: 31 October 2024
  • Embed enjoyment of reading, writing, and speaking and listening.with our fang-tastic and spooktacular activity ideas for ages 5-14
  • Hot Topic: Halloween

November 2024

Non-fiction November

Bonfire Night, Diwali and Fireworks Festivals

  • Date: 1 November 2024 Diwali
  • Date: 5 November 2024 Bonfire Night
  • Accessible inspiration for reading, writing, speaking and listening activities with a fireworks theme suitable for marking Diwali, Bonfire Night or both!
  • Hot topic: fireworks and festivals

Remembrance

December 2024

Christmas and the festive season

Events in the Spring Term 2025 calendar

January 2025

Holocaust Memorial Day

  • Date: 27 January 2025
  • Developed in partnership with trusted experts, our resources and events support students to understand the terrible impact of the Holocaust, and reflect on actions we can take to secure a safer future.
  • Holocaust Memorial Day - our resources for 2024 will remain available throughout this school year, and we'll be updating them for spring 2025.

National Storytelling Week

  • Date: January/February 2025
  • A week-long celebration of stories – spoken or written – encouraging creativity and self-expression enabling children to tell their own stories.
  • National Storytelling Week - resources and events from early years through to KS3.

Lunar New Year/Chinese New Year

February 2025

Children's Mental Health Week

  • Date: February 2025
  • Shining a spotlight on the importance of children and young people's mental health, and building on research findings that link literacy engagement with wellbeing. We have resources to help inspire pupils to explore their emotions, make meaningful connections and write for their wellbeing.
  • Children's Mental Health Week
  • Supporting wellbeing through literacy teaching

Safer Internet Day

If you're working in Alternative Provision with girls aged 11 to 14, take a look at Empower, our targeted critical media literacy programme.

March 2025

World Book Day

National Careers Week

International Women's Day

Talk to Your Baby: Early Years Conference

  • Date: tbc March 2025
  • Focusing on young children's development and communication, our landmark cross-sector conference amalgamates thought leadership and best practice for early years professionals.
  • Learn more about our annual Talk to Your Baby Early Years Conference.

Red Nose Day

  • Date: tbc March 2025
  • Through Red Nose Day, the Comic Relief charity raises funds to support a vision of a just world, free from poverty. Our research found that more boys than girls read and wrote comedy outside class, and also that more pupils eligible for free school meals than those who do not get meals said they wrote comedy at least once a month outside the classroom.
  • Comic Relief Hot Topic ideas and activities for the classroom.

National Primary Conference

  • Date: March 2025
  • Location: tbc
  • Our annual primary conference aims to celebrate best practice and explore the issues most significant to primary practitioners through a combination of thought leadership and workshops.
  • Learn more about our annual Primary Literacy Conference.

Discover upcoming classroom and training events Stay up to date with our resources and training newsletter for teachers and practitioners
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