Introducing “The Silly Squad”, this year’s Summer Reading Challenge, a free activity for children aged 4-11 in the UK!

The Reading Agency has just announced that the Summer Reading Challenge will be returning this year, along with a new website, where kids can take part in the Challenge and a “Let’s Get Silly” virtual launch event which the whole family can enjoy.

Because of the disruption caused by COVID-19 and the impact of social distancing on schools and public libraries, the all-new digital Summer Reading Challenge with its Silly Squad theme will launch earlier than usual to keep children reading over the summer and support parents/carers with kids already at home.

This year’s Summer Reading Challenge will run from June to September 2010 and to launch the new digital challenge, a whole host of virtual (super silly!) curated events with guest celebrities and authors will take place on Friday 5 June!

The website will be free to use, and will include quizzes, games and digital and downloadable activities to encourage children and their families to take part in this year’s Reading Challenge at home. Although library buildings are closed, libraries will also continue to deliver the Challenge through virtual services and e-lending platforms.

The Summer Reading Challenge encourages children aged 4-11 to read during the long summer holiday; research shows that children’s reading can ‘dip’ severely during the summer if they do not have regular access to books.

With school life disrupted and many children missing their friends, the 2020 Summer Reading Challenge will help parents/carers find fun, family-friendly activities, keep up children’s reading,plus create a safe space for children to connect with their friends.

The “Silly Squad” theme will also offer families a chance to have fun and just “GET SILLY!”, with children being encouraged to read anything that makes them happy – whether it be a comic, joke book, poetry, fiction or non-fiction, in digital or print format, from e-book lending through the public library service or from what they already have at home, with the Summer Reading Challenge official book collection as a guide.

Books can be read either by children themselves or by parents/carers reading the books out loud to them.

For more information about the 2020 Summer reading Challenge, please click here.