http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/ en Copyright 2012 Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:44:34 +0000 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification New materials for setting up and running your Chatterbooks groups:Children's 2012 Welcome Packs, and a Group Leader's Starter Pack When you buy any of the above you will also get these Chatterbooks Extra downloads and offers: termly ideas packs for session activities; Chatterbooks graphics; and special publisher promotions]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/chatterbooks-2012.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/chatterbooks-2012.html welcome Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:44:34 +0000 Now in its 17th year, the Orange Prize for Fiction remains one of the most prestigious awards in the literary calendar. We are offering free posters and stickers for you to use to promote this year's Prize.]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/orange-prize-for-fiction-2012.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/orange-prize-for-fiction-2012.html welcome Fri, 27 Jan 2012 10:44:11 +0000 The TV Book Club returns with a new series in January 2012. If you would like to promote the featured titles, please order your material here. The deadline for ordering is Monday 12 December . . . ]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/the-tv-book-club-2012-promotio.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/the-tv-book-club-2012-promotio.html welcome Wed, 23 Nov 2011 11:01:33 +0000 We are delighted to announce our 'Mood-boosting Books 2012' promotion. Following a pilot that ran in 2010-11, Mood-boosting Books returns with a new list and materials, and will launch in January 2012. The deadline for ordering is 5pm on Monday 5 December 2011 . . . ]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/mood-boosting-books-2012.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/mood-boosting-books-2012.html welcome Tue, 15 Nov 2011 17:06:45 +0000 Dumpbins are now available to order, with a deadline of 10 November 2011.]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/quick-reads-2012-dumpbins.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/quick-reads-2012-dumpbins.html welcome Mon, 17 Oct 2011 15:16:35 +0000 The Galaxy National Book Awards 2011 will take place on 4 November. We are offering materials to promote the shortlist and material to promote the winners . . . ]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/galaxy-national-book-awards-20-1.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/galaxy-national-book-awards-20-1.html welcome Thu, 22 Sep 2011 16:50:37 +0000 New materials for 2012. Buy three packs and get a pack of 125 Six Book Challenge coasters FREE!]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/six-book-challenge-2012.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/six-book-challenge-2012.html welcome Wed, 07 Sep 2011 15:58:19 +0000 Chatterbooks encourages children aged between four and twelve to read adventurously, become confident about talking about books and visit libraries with their families. Up to now, Chatterbooks groups have been run in public libraries but in a move to get more children reading more we are expanding Chatterbooks into schools...]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/chatterbooks.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/chatterbooks.html welcome Fri, 18 Sep 2009 11:53:56 +0000 Welcome to the latest HeadSpace newsletter. In this issue: • Find out what's been happening in Plymouth, Swindon and Crawley • Learn more about our exciting plans for the creative reading offer for HeadSpace • Find out about new funding opportunities, including your chance to have a scriptwriter in HeadSpace Beverley Ward's contract extended until March 2010 As you'll all know by now, Liz Roberts has left The Reading Agency and I've taken over the management of the project until the end of the funding in March 2010. As the original consultant who worked on the early stages of the project with Ciara Eastell and Liz, it's been great to come back following maternity leave to see what people have made of the HeadSpace concept. I'm excited to see young people's vision become a reality and to witness the range of excellent provision now available. Out task for the last 6 months of the project, is to maximise the opportunities for young people and to continue to raise our profile locally, regionally and nationally in order to ensure the sustainability of HeadSpace. One of my main tasks will be to help you to develop a stronger reading offer to young people in your HeadSpace, so, in addition to being available to support the day-to-day running of the project, I'll also be providing regular bulletins of creative reading ideas as well as a programme of author events. I look forward to helping you to take your HeadSpace to the next level. Beverley Launches Congratulations to HeadSpace Hartcliffe (Bristol) who launched in May 2009. Their launch event was a great success. You can see photos of their launch on http://groupthing.org/groups/headspace-hartcliffe Other launches set for the autumn are (provisional dates): October 1st HeadSpace Burgess Road, Southampton October 6th HeadSpace Medway October 30th HeadSpace Halton Spotlight on...... Plymouth A new feature where we'll be sharing some of the successes of one highlighted HeadSpace. This month, the spotlight is on Plymouth. If your HeadSpace would like to be featured in the next newsletter, please let Beverley or Kathleen know. HeadSpace at Efford Library in Plymouth has enjoyed a full-on summer of activities and events in 2009. Our volunteer Abi has launched a weekly Manga group - Mangako! following a great night at a Tokyopop Manga Re-con, including designing a promotional poster and preparing a launch event. The group wrote, directed, produced and performed a Manga play. HeadSpace Manga group Mangako! have launched their own website which includes more information about the group, upcoming events and recommended Manga for all ages. To have a look at the website click on this link: http://www.mangako.webeden.co.uk This August we hosted the guitar hero live rock-off competition, a break dancing class in the library and lyric writing with MCLyricL. The young people wrote some great mini-poems using magnetic words and put together a collage of all their photographs taken this summer. HeadSpace 15-19s posed for a glamorous photo shoot for the local paper's fashion supplement at our James Bond themed event. The library became a casino for one night only and we took part in a Bond quiz hosted by none other than Q. Last summer HeadSpace Efford set up a blog to talk about their celebration of International Youth Day. The blog is updated regularly by our volunteers Sam and Pete, and by the HeadSpace team with the latest news and reviews. You can subscribe to the blog by email or RSS feed to get the news as it happens. Check out the blog here: http://headspaceefford.wordpress.com HeadSpace 15-19s movie nights Next week at HeadSpace we will be hosting our first movie night for 15-19s from 6.30-8pm. The movies have been chosen by the young people and HeadSpace team so that we all get to watch movies we've never seen before. We'll enjoy popcorn and generally chill in the HeadSpace area. We will be showing these (up to 15 certificate) movies: Forest Gump, House of flying daggers, Man on fire, My Sister's Keeper, Transformers,Twilight, Slumdog Millionaire,Top Gun International Youth Day 2009 In celebration of International Youth Day 2009 HeadSpace took part in a streetdance workshop at the library hosted by Toby Gorniak, from the streetfactory studio. We all learned some new moves, including streetdance steps, flips and tricks. Sam and Pete were a great partnership on the dancefloor, showing off their stavros-flatley style moves! We are looking forward to visiting the new streetfactory studio as a group this autumn. MCLyricl travelled from London to host a lyric and writing workshop. We really enjoyed the warm up exercises, which showed us how to be more creative with our lyrics and vocals. Later we looked at rhyming words, similies, onomatopoeia, idioms and alliteration and used them in our lyrics. Here are some of the examples: What if I did some rhymen? What if I did some farmen? What if I was me? What if I could just be? As quick as lightening, as cool as ice, as hard as nailz... What if life sang, what if what if, dang! We ended the session writing some bitesize stories, MCLyricl gave us the first and the final sentence of this example: A girl and a boy were at a campfire party, but someone spilt some lit coal on the grass and it caught alight. Tom put his jumper over his friend Rose so she wouldn't choke. The smoke filled the air as they were finding cover. They stayed close as a heavy wind started to blow and when the smoke cleared they held hands and looked at each other... We'll be sharing all of our raps and stories at HeadSpace next Tuesday. Thanks to Europe Direct Information Service for funding our workshops and to Plymouth Evening Herald for their support in promoting and covering the event. Look out for more workshops and events at HeadSpace Efford this year. Other HeadSpace Success stories In Crawley we've been running a weekly HeadSpace evening since April and get about 10 teenagers (mostly girls!) per session. At the moment the group is working on writing and filming a zombie movie but manga drawing and book buys have also been successful, and I'd definitely recommend smoothie making during the summer. Future plans include war-gaming sessions in the hope of luring more boys and a Twilight party night with quizzes and music (credit to High Wycombe HeadSpace, I stole this last idea from them). Seeing the confidence of the group improve over the weeks has been fantastic and a couple of teens have emerged as real spokespeople for the rest of the group. So much has been happening over the past couple of months with Swindon HeadSpace! Firstly Donna Nicholson has taken on the role as HeadSpace co-ordinator in place of Sandra Seaman; she will be supporting me to manage the HeadSpace area for the life of the project. To promote the project plus Swindon Libraries in general, we recently went to The Mela and re-created the HeadSpace 'chill zone', where people could sit on a beanbag and read a book or magazine, relax and find out about all the exciting things that go on in libraries. We gave out goody bags to young people passing our way, which contained HeadSpace badges, card wallets, bookmarks, pens, plus leaflets on our summer events. The day was extremely successful, and the sunshine certainly helped! Coming up we have events happening over the summer; this includes an art event on 20th August, a superhero and comic book event, which includes a quiz and a storyboard workshop on 22nd August, and on 25th we're holding a drama workshop in partnership with Swindon Young Actors. These events are all day, and will be held where the Anne Frank exhibition was held in the Central Library - lunch will be included for participants. As well as this, we're having a poetry competition; it can be on any topic, and two submissions can be made per young person; the deadline for this is 19th August and should be handed in to the Central Library. In other news, young people on the steering group have requested we set up a debating society; therefore starting on 18th August from 5pm-6.30pm there will be fortnightly discussions in our HeadSpace area! The steering group itself has broken up for the summer, and will reconvene on 2nd September from 5pm-7pm. Our first new round of HeadSpaces is beginning with Solihul. We are opening a new library at Chelmsley Wood in November with Headspace as part of the new building. So just at the beginning really. Our first real consultation took place in July with 25 young people turning up to decide what furniture we would choose and how the area would look. We were also able to let them choose what photographs would be used for the local history area and the new Connect Centre for the council.Although the day had been planned well in advance, having half the library closed the week before to be used as an antiviral collection point left us worrying how our consultation, a children's activity and a meeting for a group of visually impaired elderly users would all fit in. We needn't have worried our young people were great, and took part in all the activities we had planned for them and we had enough pizza and cake to share some with the the elderly group who were nearby. They were kind enough to write a letter to the library manager saying how much they had enjoyed sharing their space with a group of young people and where were they from- well actually the youth offending centre! The designer also enjoyed himself and tried to persuade one of the young men involved that he ought to think about a career in design as he had such good ideas. We used an opening activity of Like/Dislike where young people made a collage from magazines articles of people in the media, food, activities etc that they liked or disliked. This worked really well and gave groups a bit of time to get to know one another and gave the less articulate a place to feel comfortable. So Headspace now planned and we move on to taking two groups to Waterstones to choose some of the resources and planning our launch event. HeadSpace Creative reading offer HeadSpace has proved really successful at building new opportunities to engage the hard to reach in libraries but it seems that, collectively, we're not providing as much as we'd like in the way of a creative reading offer. Many of you have identified that this is an area you want to improve on, so I'm in the process of putting together a creative reading bulletin to offer some ideas. My aim is to produce a monthly bulletin with a specific focus on e.g. reading groups, literacy, books and film etc The bulletin will contain some short exercises that you can use directly with young people, some project suggestions and some tips from myself, yourselves and/or other professionals. My intention is to post the bulletin on the professional side of groupthing but it will also be made available to any authority who hasn't subscribed to groupthing. In the long-term, once HeadSpace funding has expired, all access to offers such as this would be through groupthing. Alongside the bulletin, we're excited to be able to offer you a range of author events and projects through TRA's Children's Reading Partners scheme. So far we're expecting to be able to offer author events, writing workshops, graphic novel workshops, focus groups with publishers, opportunities for work experience with publishers, online writing projects and competitions, in addition to some free books for your HeadSpace. Offers such as these will be, where possible, linked to the monthly theme (e.g. we're planning work with Barrington Stoke and Ransom publishers alongside our bulletin on literacy), however offers will inevitably also come through to me and you on ad adhoc basis. Some will be open for pitching and some may be targeted directly at specific HeadSpace sites if there are geographical or other mitigating factors. In the near future, we hope to be able to post information about the range of authors available on groupthing so that your young people can browse for prospective events. In the meantime, if there's something you and your young people would particularly like, please let me know, as this will help me with my planning and will give publishers a better idea of what to offer to us. For instance, we have links at the moment with 13 publishers so it is possible that one of your groups' favourite authors is on our list of available writers. We may also be able to help with providing events focused on boys, literacy, manga etc The first creative reading bulletin will be on groupthing from 16th September. Just look on the professional side for the HeadSpace Creative Reading blog. groupthing going great guns The majority of HeadSpace sites have now signed up to groupthing along with a large number of library authorities, including the whole of the north-west region. If you haven't already done so, why not get your HeadSpace young people to set up their own groupthing group? There will be more tips on this in the Creative Reading Bulletin. Keep your eye on the professional side of groupthing as there are a range of interesting blogs from authors, publishers and other professionals on subjects as diverse as How to use Twitter, booking a poet for your library and working with graphic novels. If you'd like to submit your own blog entry about HeadSpace, please let us know. In the autumn new creative reading and author offers will be coming through groupthing such as the opportunity to take part in poetry competitions and online focus groups or to interview authors and develop online stories with writers such as Sara Starbuck. First Light funding opportunity First Light provides funding for film-making and media projects. The Reading Agency is putting in a bid on behalf of HeadSpace to develop scriptwriting projects with young people. The funds would enable your young people to work with a professional scriptwriter for a number of sessions. The deadline for bids is 24.11.09 so, if your young people would like to be part of this opportunity, please let us know by the end of September so that we have time to work up the bid. It would be helpful if you could mention any particular ideas you have for how a scriptwriter would work with your group and any end products that you'd like to produce. Evaluation update Thank you for continuing to provide the evaluation data that we request from you. We need this to justify our funding to The Big Lottery. Outcomes 7-10 Several people have said that they find it hard to evaluate the 'soft outcomes' (7-10) for HeadSpace. In response to this, I have produced a template for one-to-one interviews with young people which might help you, as I feel these outcomes are more easily measured over a period of involvement rather than one a week-by-week basis. There is no pressure to use this form but it's there as a resource if you find it useful. Use of HeadSpace Externally we're not expected to provide information about the numbers of young people using HeadSpace but it has come to my attention that we may be missing an important piece of evidence of the success of HeadSpace. If you can find an appropriate mechanism that isn't too arduous for you, it would be great to find out how many young people are typically using the space when it's not specifically being used by your group. On a related note, the original idea of the Book Waiters was to have young people manning the space on non-HeadSpace nights. I'd be interested to hear if anyone has tried this approach, or feels they could give it a try. It seems a shame that most people seem only to be offering one dedicated HeadSpace night each week and volunteers would be able to broaden this offer as well as monitoring the use of the space. Next evaluation data required 9 October 2009. Policy and funding updates Rise in NEETS You'll probably have heard on the news that the numbers of young people not in work, education or training are rising. At the latest count 835,000 or 17.6 per cent of 18-24 year olds are classed as NEET. The figure for 16-18 year olds is only slightly lower at 11.9% HeadSpace offers an opportunity to engage with this hard to reach target group, providing positive activities and a potential route, via volunteering, back into education and training. It is important the councillors and youth providers in your local area know about the important role that HeadSpace can play in addressing this key government priority. Children's and Young People's Minister, Dawn Primarollo backs calls for better information about positive activities for young people Recent reports have shown that young people want to engage with positive activities but don't know where to access them. The research has also revealed other reasons preventing young people getting involved in activities. These include: • Young people see organised activities as something reserved only for the very sporty or talented kids; • Peer group pressure - teenagers prioritise friends and leisure time over taking part in activities and are often put off if their friends don't take part; • Low self confidence and lack of self belief in their ability to take part. Dawn Primarollo has called for local authorities to make sure they are publicising their positive activities widely and in the right places. Make sure HeadSpace is included in any new publicity that your area is producing. PAYP Friday and Saturday night opening There is still a big push for youth provision to be open on a Friday and Saturday night and there may still be funding available in some areas. Keep up to date with Friday and Saturday night openings in your area. New organisation - the National Youth Leadership Body The National Youth Leadership Body runs a scheme called The Youth of Today which aims to offer young people leadership opportunities such as the chance to shadow a councillor and to contribute to policy debates. Young people can also access leadership training. There is funding attached but unfortunately the deadline has now passed. It looks likely that more funding will be available so keep your eyes on their website and their blog at www.theyouthoftoday.org Also on their site is information about Young Achievers Award. Young people can be nominated for their contributions and achievements until 29th September so if you've got an exceptional HeadSpace volunteer, have a look at this site. V Involved V Involved is the national body for youth volunteering. Several HeadSpaces have made positive links with V who have recruited volunteers and handled much of the administration associated with volunteering. The V Fifty Award is also a new accreditation scheme that could be used in HeadSpace. Young people do all of the recording themselves online and need to complete 50 hours of volunteering to qualify for an award. V has also launched a series of awards that young volunteers can be nominated for. Nominations for this year have just closed but the awards are likely to continue next year. Young people winning awards is great for their self-esteem and great for the profile of HeadSpace as well. V funding opportunities: V Cashpoint, provides young people (16-25) with funding to develop their own volunteering projects. Young people in HeadSpace could apply so long as the idea they had was new and had come from them. V also provides other funding opportunities. Keep an eye on their site at http://www.vinspired.com/v/funding Youth Initiative funding available Funding is available from the British Council for projects that are youth-led and which have a European dimension. Young people 15-30 can apply for the funding of up to £8000 for projects that last between 3 and 18 months. It's just a case of being creative about what a 'European dimension' means - sessions on European cooking, literature, politics or cultural activities could all be possibilities. Emma Sheriff in Plymouth has had European funding for some of her activities. For more information see: http://www.britishcouncil.org/connectyouth-programmes-youth-initiatives.htm Training opportunity for frontline managers of young people's services FPM training are running a Management Development Programme for leaders of services to young people. They have indicated an interest in libraries applying for the training which is free and looks like a great opportunity to develop skills for managing young people's services. For more information see their website www.fpmonline.co.uk and click on the link to Services for Young People. Or contact them directly on 0116 2495000. Your Integrated Youth Support Service Manager should also have information about the training. Beverley also has some leaflets that she can send you if you are interested. Out of the Box Out of the Box projects are running across the country and may be operating in your area (indeed you may be running one). They are small projects based on youth and library partnership, looking into ways to engage non-readers. Find out it there's one nearby and share your learning. Mediabox and First Light funding Mediabox provide funding for young people 13-19 to make creative media projects for film, tv, radio, web etc Mixmedia is a new strand of Mediabox funding providing £5-20,000 for youth-led projects that focus on community cohesion. First Light is providing funding for scriptwriters to work with young people. For more information about these funding schemes see: http://www.firstlightonline.co.uk/funding/ Pledge "RespectSpeakUP" The Respect? Campaign is led by eight 16-24 year olds who form the Respect Young People's Advisory Group. It aims to improve the portrayal of young people in the media. The campaign has been going since 2005 and is now entering a new phase to encourage young people to speak up in the media. They're asking 1,000 young people to sign a pledge to speak up when they see a story in the news that affects them using new media tools. Postcards to promote the campaign can be obtained from media@youthnet.org. Young people can sign up at www,pledgebank.com/RespectSpeakUp or join the Facebook group. Young people's media portrayal is alarmingly negative and HeadSpace presents young people with the opportunity to improve their media image through the promotion of their work. Joining this campaign links naturally to our targets of empowering young people and also to reading. Why not spend an evening looking at media coverage of young people and then respond with letters and emails to editors? And finally.... Project plans! Thanks to those authorities who have provided me with project plans for 2009-2010. These were originally due in July. Sorry to pester you to do yet more admin but it will really help me to be able to target offers and support in your direction if you send me your project plan by the end of September 2009 at the latest. Thanks so much, Beverley and Kathleen http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/headspace-newsletter.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/headspace-newsletter.html Fri, 04 Sep 2009 12:05:22 +0000 Promote your HeadSpace to young people with the HeadSpace t-shirts, posters, flyers, bookmarks, badges and wallets. Available in a Value Pack as individual items, the HeadSpace materials are despatched as soon as your order is made.]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/headspace-promotional-material.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/headspace-promotional-material.html welcome Wed, 22 Jul 2009 15:44:35 +0000 promotions calendar to help you plan the projects you'd like to run during the year.]]> http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/welcome-to-the-reading-agencys.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/welcome-to-the-reading-agencys.html welcome-intro Mon, 02 Jun 2008 13:25:17 +0000 http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/test.html http://www.readingagency.org.uk/shop/test.html promotions Mon, 07 Apr 2008 10:33:33 +0000