Getting young people reading again
So what is Brilliant Books and who is it for?
Brilliant Books is a project aimed at promoting creative writing and reading as an extra-curricular activity in schools. Brilliant Books was created with young people in mind. We aim to build confidence in literacy and engagement with all levels and styles of writing and reading.
We look at a variety of writing styles: prose, poetry and drama, and centre each lesson around one style of writing. Children are encouraged to read their work to the class, engage in performance art and understand critical feedback.
​
​
What could Brilliant Books teach Children?
Brilliant Books would help establish the key themes of English study in both Primary and Secondary education, with tailored sessions to each year group.
Imaginative and creative learning has been highlighted as essential for cognitive development in children:
1. It enables independent thinking, challenges conventions and assumptions and encourages analysis of questions
2. It encourages empathy in relationships, builds communication skills and the ability to reflect on previous experiences
3. It promotes problem solving through alternative strategies
4. It encourages critical thinking and feedback
​
The Brilliant Books Objectives
1. To promote reading in book-shy children
2. To encourage imaginative learning and development
3. To challenge (sometimes ingrained) negative attitudes towards reading and writing
4. To provide children from disadvantaged backgrounds with an opportunity that they wouldn’t usually have access to
5. To produce a book (online or paperback) with their name and story included
6. To encourage kindness and confidence when delivering peer reviews and develop the ability to self-assess or deliver fair peer reviews
7. To build confidence in writing and reading ability
The project can be adapted and adjusted to different learning levels – and we have taught in Primary Schools and Secondary Schools across Nottingham. Brilliant Books encourages engagement with different creative processes, collating the work done by students into a self-published book, which is usually published in-class, and by the students, providing them with tangible evidence of their work.
“As we tell stories about the lives of others, we learn to imagine what another creature might feel in response to various events. At the same time, we identify with the other creature and learn something about ourselves.” – Martha C Nussbaum.
Nussbaum argues that humanity is cultivated by three capacities: the third being the capacity for narrative imagination – the ability to empathize with others and put oneself in another’s place. She also argues that this is essential for moral thinking; ergo, imagination, creative writing and literature develops morality.
Nussbaum also suggests that literature is more subtle as an educational tool. Where philosophy can often be too defined to adequately express complex moral truths, literature can more easily and clearly explain the messiness of life.
As Nussbaum posits, does imaginative writing encourage empathy in people? Does imaginative writing encourage people to consider the experiences of others? We think it does, and we think that imaginative writing is essential for creative expression, emotional intelligence and building moral reasoning. Only through the process of imagination can we expand the individual experience of empathetic understanding/reasoning.