The Learning Resources Centre

Book Club

Book Club, which meets every Tuesday lunchtime, has grown from strength to strength in recent years. The boys like the inclusivity of the group –it’s more like a family who look out for each other.

It’s very rewarding running the group as we see the younger boys grow in confidence as the year progresses. This has become more evident this year with the club being included as part of the Asynchronous Afternoons sessions from April running on Microsoft Teams. The students have taken on more responsibility with helping to run the club on Teams, creating and running their own quizzes as well as suggesting and introducing the Reading School Book Award which commenced in May.

In early March, we once again ran our hugely popular and beneficial Book Festival. This is a great way for all boys to meet and learn from a real-life author. Members of the Book Club had the opportunity to take part in an exclusive question and answer session with authors Sarah Govett and Chris Bradford. 7E with their new books and laptops World Mental Health Day Pupil Librarian, Ammar (10E), and Wellbeing Prefect, Shaan (13MK), ran a complimentary tea and exam tips lunch time drop-in for World Mental Health Day on the 10th of October. Pupils were invited to give a friend a compliment as they enjoyed some relaxing herbal tea, and everyone agreed that they felt good afterwards. Free Books and New Laptops

The Goldfish Boy, by Lisa Thompson, was gifted to all Year 7 students from the English Department during their LRC induction at the start of the year –thanks to the RSPA for funding this

The RSPA also supported independent study in the LRC by generously funding a total of 27 new laptops and a new secure laptop charger cabinet. The LRC laptops have been loaned 11,411 times this academic year, an average of 368 times for each laptop.

Thank you to the Reading School Parents’ Association for all of their support.

The LRC Book Club with Chris Bradford

The boys also selected and promoted a fiction and non-fiction book that was advertised on the school digital display screens. They chose The Territory, by Sarah Govett, for the fiction category and Physics of the Impossible, by Michio Kaku, for the non-fiction. This encouraged a wider range of reading for the school community and Physics of the Impossible was nominated and chosen as a shortlisted book for our Reading School Book Award lockdown non-fiction read.

The club has thrived in these uncertain times, adapting to the changing circumstances and uses of technology. The successful transition to remote Book Club meetings has made the club accessible to a wider audience as meetings are

recorded.

Students mix and mingle to discuss mental health