Reading for Pleasure is surely the entitlement of every child. There is strong evidence linking reading for pleasure and educational outcomes. We know that academic attainment is of vital importance, but the benefits of reading for pleasure go beyond this and stretch throughout a person's life. Reading for pleasure has many non-literacy benefits and can increase empathy, improve relationships with others, reduce the symptoms of depression and improve wellbeing throughout life (The Reading Agency 2015).

Fiction can take you to countries you may never visit, or live someone else’s life. You can go back in history or be taken to a future world. 

At Ashton we work hard foster a love of reading. 

Every day, students at Ashton partake in DEAR time (Drop Everything and Read) time is set aside for students to read a book of their choice from the Accelerated Reader Programme for 15 minutes. Students in key stage 3 also have an accelerated reader lesson once a week. 

To find out more about Accelerated Reader click here
 

Accelerated Reader is proving to be a huge success at Ashton!

In year 7, 78% of pupils have made accelerated progress since September. There are so many individual success stories it is hard to mention them all. We have students who have read books that challenge them academically and students who didn’t enjoy reading but now love nothing more than being immersed in a story. The students above however, deserve a special mention as they are the top 7 in the year for progress.