Christmas at The Children's Book Project
As part of Broadsword’s regular group volunteering, we organised a day at The Children’s Book Project.
The project helps to support some of the most fundamental emotional and social needs of children. Book ownership has been directly linked with improved mental health amongst children whilst reading fluency itself has a significant impact on children’s successful progression through education. By age eleven, there is a 12-month language development gap between children from book rich homes books and those with fewer than ten books.
Broadsword helped to quality check the preloved book donations in the warehouse before they were organised by age group. Then we had the chance to complete an order for a local school, selecting 916 books and packing them up for a book gifting event. It was incredible to know that our support was having a direct impact — that’s 408 children getting 2 books of their own this term! The project partner with many schools across the country, targeting communities presenting a high level of socioeconomic disadvantage, and continue to gift books every term. The project donated 500,000 books in 2024!
The gifting is done through bookshop events at the school that empower the children to choose a book they are motivated and excited to read, powering self expression and reading communities and increasing the likelihood that the child will engage with the book. We also helped to create a bookshop kit for the event by creating bunting to go up at the school out of the damaged picture books that couldn’t be donated.
The whole experience was joyful. When we asked which books we should be packing, the leader of the session asked us to choose with our hearts — the team were drawn to the books they had grown up being read by their parents, or read to their own children. We were amazed by the sheer number of generous donations, that so many were family favourites. It made us realise just how lucky we were to recognise so many of these books. That these titles had clearly stuck so fondly in our memories, was inherent to the impact that we were making.