First let’s look at strategies for engaging the hard-to-reach. Growing attendance at a reading-focussed morning/afternoon/evening can be a simple matter of researching most popular times and dates, and of serving appealing refreshments. But we can go beyond this: What if the event was tagged on to a performance or award assembly? What if the invitation included a raffle ticket, and the draw was at the end of the event? What about a "cinema evening", or similar, rather than just a creche, for the children of attendees?  And what if the children of the parents you really want to attend were the ones with high-status welcoming /hosting roles? … And if none of these work, consider the barriers the adult is facing: Is it lack of time? Is it fear? How might a one-to-one situation be procured?

Once you have an audience, of any size, it can be useful to read them a bit of beautiful text (I like to use a bit of one of Oscar Wilde’s short stories, as the writing is profound but age-appropriate and accessible) and get them to consider the power of Just Listening. I like to follow this up with something to read together – ideally, a fun poem with strong rhythm and rhyme, especially one that you can do actions for, like Michael Rosen’s Hand on the Bridge. This will lead neatly into talking about the three reading modes: reading to, reading with, and reading by children. They’ve just engaged in and reflected upon the first two, but many will have thought that the third is everything. I like to make the point that listening to their child read is powerful and vital…but so are the other two! With reference to The Simple View of Reading, we can make the point that listening to – and helping – their child read a book is superb for the development of word reading, but reading a more challenging/interesting book to their child is wonderful for the development of comprehension and vocabulary – especially if there is some talk alongside. And reading together, sharing bits, getting the child to join in with repeats, is going to develop fluency – the magic ingredient that binds word-reading and comprehension. These last two – reading to and reading with the child – may need special emphasis with the aforementioned parents who feel that once their child can read, the job is done; I always make the point that all of us can listen at a level higher than we would choose to read for ourselves.

Some parents want to know about "comprehension questions", but I’ve found many more to be interested in a more relaxed "book talk": things like, "How would you feel if that happened to you?", "I found that hilarious/ scary/ thrilling – did you?", and, "I wonder why she did that?" This kind of talk is less academic and more about sharing an experience.

But going back to those parents for whom time and/or fear is the limiting factor, re-introduce the idea of just listening to story, and then do everything possible to get audio stories into the home – via site links, the school portals, sending CDs home; anything that will work. The child listening to wonderful – carefully selected – stories read by an expert is a pretty good alternative, and if it’s sustained over months, you’ll likely see improvement in their vocabulary and sentence structure, and even their desire to read for themselves. If the parent listens alongside, this becomes a powerful shared experience, and talking about the story together (in any language) will be wonderful for comprehension. And listening to an easier audio at home while following the text simultaneously can support the development of fluency, too.

An at-home focus on reading by children is brilliant for the development of word reading, but if we can broaden this to include reading to (or listening with) children, we’ll reach more homes, develop more comprehension, and perhaps even grow a love of reading, too.