Clark and Lant (NLT, 2019) found that both reading enjoyment levels and reading achievement are higher in pupils that have taken part in an author event. The Liverpool Children’s Festival of Reading is a series of digital events designed to raise aspirations, promote creative careers and encourage children to read and write for pleasure.

All of our member schools are invited to attend free online events featuring a diverse and inclusive range of authors, illustrators and poets. Each attending class receives a copy of the book being discussed for their reading area as well as resources to help the teacher embed the book within the curriculum. The festival was established as a face-to-face event in 2019 which was described by the author Jen Campbell as “one of the most organised festivals I have ever been to.”

In 2020 the planned face to face event was cancelled and led to us delivering a live streamed event during lockdown in 2021 that children in schools and families learning at home could all access. The online event, despite originally being a contingency plan, showed us how digital delivery allowed even more children to access author events than ever. Since then, we have continued to deliver the festival digitally with 17000 pupils from Nursery to Y9 accessing sessions in January/February 2023 and overwhelmingly positive feedback from schools: “This was a brilliant event! It was a great opportunity for the children to ‘meet’ an author!”

We will be holding the 2024 events in the weeks beginning 22nd and 29th January. You can book on to the events at the link below.

If you are a non-LLP school who would like to take part, please email admin@liverpoollearningpartnership.com for costs!

If you’d like to know more about our events or are interested in supporting or sponsoring our future events, please contact jenny@liverpoollearningpartnership.com