Do we really learn from Book Week?

As a parent, book week can feel stressful. There are costumes and often a different outfit every day for Book Week. Does it have to be a book? Can it be a movie character? Sigh! It can be tricky, but Book Week is valuable beyond dress-ups.

We developed a whole lesson around Book Week, and the children loved it!

Our lesson was based on Eric Carle's story, 'Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?'

The book facilitated many learning opportunities - animals, colours, rhyme, and repetition.

The different animals—where they live, what colour they are, what characteristics they have, have the children seen them before, do they have them as pets, would a real animal usually be that colour—these are all fantastic discussions to build their oral language and vocabulary.

Each animal is a different colour. Throughout the story, the children matched the colours of the animals to a coloured rainbow wheel and used the colours to help them recall which animal came next, as they were encouraged to retell the story.

We know that children learn through repetition and memorisation. This teaches children to internalise concepts, helps strengthen the brain's neural connections for learning, and gives them confidence. This book repeats the same sentence from page to page, just with the animal changing, e.g., "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see? I see a red bird looking at me. Red Bird, Red Bird, what do you see? I see a yellow duck looking at me. Yellow Duck, Yellow Duck," and so on.

Rhyme is also a critical skill in children's language and literacy development, helping them learn about words and sounds in words. Using that repeated phrase, the book rhymes all the way through with ‘'see’' and ‘'me.’'

We always encourage fine motor skill development at Reading Bees, and our Book Week lesson was no different. The colour wheel activity used pegs, and the children had to squeeze them open to peg the pictures onto the wheel. A story pattern tracing sheet helped to enhance hand-eye coordination, muscle control, and grip strength. We also did a bear paper plate craft activity where students tore tissue paper into small pieces and practised their scissor-cutting skills.

We appreciate the effort Book Week requires for our families and thank you for being part of another successful Book Week. Until next year's Book Week...!