How to ensure reading can be unlocked by things children and teens already love | Series 1, Episode 42

Episode 42 transcript

How to ensure reading can be unlocked by things children and teens already love

Perhaps the strongest part of the National Year of Reading 2026 is not that it asks children to read more. Schools have been doing that for decades. Its strength is that it starts somewhere more honest: with the things children and teenagers already care about.

Go All In, led by the National Literacy Trust with the Department for Education, is built around the line “If you’re into it, read into it.” It asks children, families and schools to treat reading as a way into football, gaming, music, fashion, food, film, family life, science fiction, sport, hobbies and whatever else already has a hold on a child’s attention.

That matters because the national picture is grim. The National Literacy Trust’s 2025 survey, based on 114,970 responses from children and young people aged 5 to 18, found that only 32.7% of 8- to 18-year-olds enjoyed reading in their free time. Only 18.7% read daily in their free time. These are not small dips. They are the lowest reading enjoyment figures recorded by the Trust in 20 years.

The same report gives schools a practical way forward. Children were more likely to feel motivated to read when the material connected to a film or TV series they enjoyed, matched their interests or hobbies, or gave them freedom to choose. That is the evidence base behind Go All In. The campaign is not asking teachers to make reading compete with pupils’ lives. It is asking them to make reading useful inside those lives.

The teenage data makes this even sharper. In the National Literacy Trust’s 2026 report on teenage reading, based on more than 80,000 young people aged 11 to 16, the steepest falls in reading engagement happen in early adolescence. By 14 to 16, only 18.8% of boys said they enjoyed reading, compared with 37.7% of girls. The report also found that teenagers often still valued reading, but found it easy to lose the habit when schoolwork, screens, sport, fatigue and convenience took over.

This is not a case for giving up on books. It is a case for making book discovery more intelligent.

BookTrust’s evidence summary on book choice says that allowing children to choose what they read strengthens motivation, especially when their preferences are respected. Choice gives children autonomy, lets them pick books that align with their interests and identities, and helps them build a sense of themselves as readers. The point is simple enough for any classroom: a child who has a reason to pick something up is more likely to start.

The harder question is whether the children’s and YA market is giving schools enough of the right starting points.

Children’s interests in 2026 are not neatly arranged by curriculum topic. Ofcom reports that 97% of 8- to 17-year-olds play online games, and that 53% of those gamers have spent money in games. It also found confusion and regret around online spending. That points to reading opportunities far beyond Minecraft annuals or coding manuals: game design, online economies, persuasive design, scams, esports, storytelling, modding, digital safety and how platforms make money.

Sport is just as broad. ASA research with 11- to 17-year-olds found strong interest across men’s and women’s football, swimming, athletics, Formula 1, boxing and basketball. On average, young people said they were “really interested” in four different sports, with friends and social media becoming more influential as children grew older. A school sports shelf built mainly from football biographies is not enough for that range of interest.

Teenagers are also navigating money, friendships, mental health, jobs, online pressure and future plans. The government’s Youth Matters summary draws on the voices of more than 14,000 young people in England aged 10 to 21, and up to 25 for those with SEND. It identifies concerns around mental health, money, safety, online life, friendship, belonging, support and the lack of affordable places to spend time. These are obvious reading routes: practical money books, friendship guides, mental health titles, online safety explainers, careers books, apprenticeship guides, short teen fiction and non-fiction that treats young people’s worries as real rather than as an adult-led “issue”.

There are gaps here, but they need to be described carefully. It is not true that UK publishing has no books on these subjects. The problem is more often volume, speed, pitch and discoverability. There are books about gaming, sport, fashion, climate, money and online life, but not always enough at the right age, length, tone and reading level. There are books for older teens, but many younger teenagers sit awkwardly between middle grade and adult-facing YA. There is accessible non-fiction, but too much of it still feels adult-approved before it feels child-wanted. There are also plenty of contemporary fiction titles that cover these high demand areas through characters, settings and representation; but the blurbs and synopses don’t always make it explicitly clear, and for many readers these titles dip under their radars.

Representation also needs careful handling. The evidence does not prove that children have specifically asked for more representative pet stories, sport books or gaming novels. But it does show that many children struggle to find people like themselves in what they read. The National Literacy Trust’s 2022 diversity survey, based on 48,672 children aged 8 to 18, found that 38.9% found it difficult to find books with characters or people like them, rising to 53.1% among children aged 8 to 11. The same proportion, 38.9%, agreed that reading about characters like them made them feel more confident. Inclusive Books for Children’s 2025 Excluded Voices report then shows the supply problem for younger readers: of 2,721 UK books for ages 1 to 9 published in 2024, only 5.9% had marginalised neurodivergent, disabled or minoritised ethnic main characters. The evidence supports a representation gap. But it does not justify turning every gap into an identity lesson. Publishing’s approach to representation needs to be more subtle, nuanced and rooted in what children and teens actually say they want to read.

For schools, the answer is not to replace one approved canon with another. It is to build more routes in. A pupil who loves rugby can read match reports, biographies, fiction, sports science, injury recovery, nutrition, teamwork, history and stories about pressure and belonging. A child who follows fashion can move from design books to sustainability, biography, craft, photography, magazines and fiction. A gamer can read about world-building, coding, online economies, scams, competition, narrative design and virtual worlds. A teen drawn to romantasy can be guided towards folklore, Gothic fiction, myth, court politics, power, consent, world-building and literary fantasy.

School Reading List’s genre work is useful because it starts from that practical classroom problem: what does a teacher or librarian put in front of the child who says they do not read, but talks endlessly about rugby, farming, fashion, combat sports, fishing, cricket, survival, bushcraft, religion, romantasy or manga? Its genre hub already includes interest-led pages for children and teens across sport, identity, belief, hobbies, genre fiction, non-fiction and cross-curricular topics. [] Recent focus-group led examples include rugby books for children and teens, romantasy books for teens, books about fashion, combat sports, fishing, farming, cricket and survival and bushcraft.

That kind of curation based on genuine reported need has real value in schools because teachers need fast, trusted routes from pupil interest to suitable reading. A generic “read more” campaign can fade quickly. A shelf, display or booklist built around what pupils already discuss at breaktime has a better chance of becoming part of school culture.

The publishing challenge is just as clear. If Go All In is to work beyond posters and assemblies, publishers need to commission closer to children’s actual enthusiasms. More short, strong, affordable non-fiction for 8- to 14-year-olds. More real teen publishing for 12- to 15-year-olds. More sport beyond the obvious. More books on gaming as culture, business, art and safety. More media literacy and AI literacy written for children who already use the internet as a research tool. More practical life-skills publishing that speaks plainly about money, work, friendship, stress and independence.

The best reading culture does not begin by asking children to abandon what they love. It begins by taking those interests seriously. Go All In gives schools a useful frame: whatever a child is into can become a route into stories, facts, argument, explanation and imagination. The work now is to make those routes visible, current and easy to follow.

Further reading and useful sources

• National Literacy Trust: National Year of Reading 2026 – Official overview of the National Year of Reading and Go All In campaign, including the campaign’s focus on passions and interests.
• National Literacy Trust: Go All In brand identity launch – Explains the campaign proposition “If you’re into it, read into it” and the move towards reading through appeal, relevance and existing interests.
• National Literacy Trust: Children and Young People’s Reading in 2025 – Major survey of 114,970 children and young people, with findings on reading enjoyment, daily reading, motivation, choice, hobbies and links to film and TV.
• National Literacy Trust: Teenage Reading – Reframing the Challenge – Research on 11- to 16-year-olds, showing the sharp fall in reading enjoyment during adolescence and the importance of interest-led reading routes.
• BookTrust: Why book choice matters for children – Evidence summary for teachers on how choice, autonomy and children’s interests support reading motivation and reader identity.
• National Literacy Trust: Seeing yourself in what you read – Research on diversity, representation and children’s ability to find books with characters or people like themselves.
• Ofcom: UK children’s online lives – Useful evidence on children’s gaming habits, online activity and in-game spending, with clear implications for reading routes around gaming and digital culture.
• Ofcom: Media literacy bulletin – Evidence on young people’s news habits, including TikTok, YouTube and online platforms as major sources of information for teenagers.
• Advertising Standards Authority: Young people, media, sport and celebrities – Research on 11- to 17-year-olds’ interests in sport, celebrities, social media and advertising, including football, Formula 1, boxing and basketball.
• GOV.UK: Youth Matters – State of the Nation – Government summary of young people’s concerns, including mental health, money, friendship, school, safety, online life and future plans.
• Inclusive Books for Children: Excluded Voices 2025 – Report on representation in UK children’s books for ages 1 to 9, including disabled, neurodivergent and minoritised ethnic main characters.
• CLPE: Reflecting Realities – Long-running research project examining ethnic representation in UK children’s literature.
• HarperCollins UK: 14-25 reading, YA and wellbeing research – Research on young people’s reading habits, reader identity and wellbeing, including low daily reading among 14- to 25-year-olds.
• Kesia Lupo: The State of YA – Industry discussion of the gap between middle grade, YA and adult crossover publishing, including the problem of underpublishing for actual teenagers.
• School Reading List: Genre booklists for children and teens – Interest-led booklists for teachers, librarians and parents, covering sport, hobbies, genres, identity, belief, non-fiction and teen reading interests.