National Teen Book Club

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Please note: as you would expect, the educator retains primary responsibility for student behaviour and safeguarding.

We primarily cater to young people aged 14-19 as the featured reads fall under the category of Young Adult fiction (YA fiction) which is aimed at readers aged 14+. However, in response to requests, we will allow young people aged 11-13 to take part provided you as the educator are happy to support their participation. Trigger warnings will be issued in advance and it will be at your discretion to decide whether you deem the reading material suitable for all the students in your group. Readers read at their own pace, so there is no pressure to keep to a reading schedule.

Our National Teen Book Club is committed to inclusivity, and to continually reviewing ways we can evolve our offer and improve accessibility. It is essential that young people engage with the featured reads to get the most from the sessions. This could be through reading the book independently or listening to it as an audiobook (where available), or it could be through supported group reading activity and discussion in school. We avoid spoilers and encourage students to read at their own pace. We also advocate the use of eBooks where possible, as these allow for adjustments to text size as well as active note-taking, highlighting, searching and looking up unfamiliar words. As the topics dealt with and the level of literacy required vary from book to book, we rely on teachers to review the suitability of each title for their group and to alert us to any access requirements that we may be able to support with reasonable adjustments. For example, the speaker Q&A as part of our live events and recordings (both of which offer the option to turn on captions) is shaped in part by the questions submitted by our audience, so if your young people may not be able to follow a lengthy or high-level discussion then please alert us, and we will be sure to start with their questions. We would also be very pleased to hear from any SEND schools that would be interested in working with us on developing our offer to meet the specific needs of their students.

The only cost for taking part is the charge for purchasing the heavily discounted book! We’ll explain how to order at a discount once you’re school or college is registered. You may also be able to get discounted audiobook or eBook for some titles.

To participate, you (the educator) will need to register your student group with our easy and safeguarded system and ensure that each young person has access to our featured book. National Teen Book Club is delivered online via Microsoft Teams, which means that you can include an unlimited number of young people from your school or college in your student group. For each featured read, we run four weekly live events that take place on Wednesdays from 3.30 pm to 4.30 pm. The event link is shared via email with you (the educator) and it will fall to you to ensure that there is a responsible adult on site with your students to supervise and facilitate each of the weekly sessions in a classroom or assembly hall at your school/college’s premises. There will be points during the live events when you and your students can opt to join in by appearing on camera, speaking over the microphone or writing comments in the chat. Please be aware that we record all the live events and will be making them publicly available via our website afterwards, so you will need to check your school policies and permissions with regard to consent. We have a template consent form for parents HERE.

No specialist training is required. We recommend downloading the Teams app for ease, then simply click the event links to join the live sessions. We will guide you through the rest.

National Teen Book Club encourages young people to read widely for pleasure while developing knowledge, skills, and confidence in responding critically, evaluatively, and creatively. The programme provides a chance to read, understand, and share a personal response to a selection of six different texts over the course of the year, examining the language, form, and structure used by the writer and considering each individual book’s themes in relation to its context.

Young Adult fiction (YA fiction) deals with topical, challenging, and sometimes controversial themes, many of which link to the PSHE curriculum, and which are often explored from new perspectives.

As well as being an enrichment activity that can enhance literacy and critical thinking skills, National Teen Book Club offers a novel way to supplement your students’ careers education. Over the course of the live events, students will gain a greater insight into careers in publishing, meet people working in a wide range of roles, and build their employability skills. As such, this programme meets Gatsby Benchmark 5.

National Teen Book Club links to the Skills Builder Framework for essential skills – most closely the skills of Listening and Speaking. There will be plenty of opportunities for your students to practice these skills, but to develop these skills, they must actively participate in the discussion groups. As their facilitator, any help you can provide to encourage your students’ active participation will assist them in this regard.

Ideally, you and your entire student group will need to join us for each of the four live events relating to the featured read to gain the full benefit of the programme. If your class – or an individual student – misses one, they’ll be able to watch the recording back on Vimeo via our website. We know things may come up which prevent you attending on occasion too: rest assured that any adult facilitator from your school/college is able to cover the session. Please note that we do not expect students to follow a reading schedule so there is no pressure to read the book at a certain pace.

We read a diverse range of books and enjoy six specially selected picks per academic year. Past featured reads from the last academic year (2022 to 2023) have included novels by Femi Fadugba, Karen M. McManus, Natasha Bowen, Mariam Ansar, Jenny Ireland, and Jen St. Jude. Details of our upcoming books will be shared on the website as they are announced. You can also stay up-to-date by signing up to our mailing list

No specialist training is required. You can simply click the event link sent via email to join the live sessions. We will guide you through the rest.