Books & Quizzes

Nearly fifty years on from the Stonewall Riots that helped kick-start the Gay Liberation Movement, this February marks LGBT History Month. The theme for 2019 is Peace, Activism and Reconciliation. To celebrate, we’ve picked out some great fiction and non-fiction books for all interest levels that are sure to get kids exploring LGBT history and […]

The countdown to Christmas has begun and, as ever, we’d like to share with you some of our favourite Christmas reads with recently published quizzes, to get your students in the mood for their upcoming break. We are feeling very festive here in the Renaissance office; check out some of the Content team sporting our cheesy […]

On Friday 30th November, teachers, headteachers and librarians from schools across the UK and Ireland headed towards Canary Wharf, East London. Waiting for them on the 14th floor of the South Quay building was a night to remember…

In this guest post, one of the UK’s first users of Renaissance Accelerated Reader talks about both the impact the programme had motivating reluctant readers and encouraging reading for pleasure – as well as her new book, ‘World War One Warriors’.

Book Week Scotland is running from Monday 19th – Sunday 25th November. It’s a week in which people gather in libraries, workplaces and schools to get involved in all sorts of exciting literary events with Scottish authors, illustrators and poets. And this year’s theme is Rebel! The Scottish Book Trust are asking readers to vote […]

We wouldn’t ask a child to run before they can walk… so why would we ask them to sit an assessment if they don’t have the reading skills to be able to decode what is being asked of them?
Well, in primary schools we wouldn’t dream of this. But when reading is one of the hardest skills to assess objectively, how do we truly know what level of reading comprehension a child possesses?

“As any primary teacher will know, the transition from Year 2 to Year 3 is always a tricky one. Not only do we have to prepare teacher assessments by relying on our best judgement, the children are also suddenly faced with lots of new concepts and much higher expectations in terms of progress. Now, for maths and writing it’s very easy to objectively gauge where they are in their development. Reading is a completely different ball game.”

During my time at Renaissance, I’ve been fortunate to work very closely with the schools on our Renaissance School Partnership Programme. During my visits to these schools, similar questions and concerns emerged; Literacy Coordinators, who were responsible for Renaissance Accelerated Reader, wanted to find ways to embed its success across the curriculum.