Rachel Ward

Archive for July, 2013

Patron of Reading – Pontypridd High School Summer Postcard Challenge

When I heard about the Patron of Reading Scheme I thought what a good idea it was and it sounded like something I could probably do. I put my name forward and it took a few weeks for Jennifer Jacques Van-Baaren, English Teacher and Literacy Co-ordinator at Pontypridd High School, to get in touch and ask if I would be their Patron of Reading. I visited in February, and the deal was sealed.

As my first project, I’ve set the staff and students a Summer Postcard Challenge. All they have to do is tell me about the best book they read this summer, writing the title, author and a sentence about why they like it on a postcard or the back of a stuck down envelope. I’ll put all the entries into a hat and one lucky winner will receive signed copies of all my books (plus maybe some extra goodies).

The idea just popped into my head. It’s easy, fun and, rather sneakily, it’s a good way for me to find out what students are reading and enjoying (at least the ones that do read at the moment).

As I live a fair way from the school, I couldn’t launch the challenge in person so I recorded a little video (with a lot of help from my daughter) and posted it on YouTube  (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DgIg1D_sX4). The video is being shown to English classes during the last week of term, there will be an article and link on the school website, and Jennifer, the school and I have also tweeted about it.

Twitter is a marvellous thing and we’ve had retweets from Ash Morgan who featured on The Voice and from Welsh rugby players. Ash has promised to send in a postcard about his favourite summer read too! The more we can show that all sorts of cool people read, the better!

I’ve no idea how many postcards I’ll receive – the idea may or may not work – but I’ve already had a lot of fun with it and Jen assures me that the students are buzzing about it. Let’s hope the sunny weather lasts through the school holidays and September brings a hatful of good books.

P.S. I’m adding a gratuitous link to Ash singing an Amy Winehouse song, just because I can.

Tuesday, July 16th, 2013 (1 Comments) (Permalink) 

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