It is has been said that teenagers can be characterised by being in a perpetual state of ‘fitting in by standing out’. As I ruminated on this thought, I had a startling revelation: I (and I dare say many of my fellow tweeters) am exactly the same. Who doesn’t love sharing an ‘unpopular opinion’ and receiving confirmation of their ‘unique’ views by many strangers? The (I believe intended) irony is that most ‘unpopular’ opinions turn out to be nothing of the sort.
Persistent ‘unpopular opinions’ rear their heads at various points of the year. I could fill a short book with some of my ‘favourites’ (I’m talking about you, Valentine’s Day haters!), but I must focus. We are now entering a time of year in which one of my most hated popular unpopular opinions begins to rear its head: there is no value in dressing up for World Book Day. By sharing some of my own experiences both as a child and a teacher, I hope to address some of the (legitimate) concerns about the role of dress-up on Book Day, and seek to encourage some less-than-enthusiastic dresser-uppers to consider once again the true value of the exercise.
I will start by saying this: I am a man who is repelled by the idea of tradition for tradition’s sake. I reacted with disbelief when a close relative scooped Brussels’ Sprouts onto their plate at Christmas, despite not liking them, all in the holy name of tradition. I just don’t get it. That being said, if your only reason for dressing up for World Book Day is ‘we’ve always done it’… then I would humbly suggest either dropping it completely, or at least re-evaluating why it is a policy in your school!
I have debated the best way of structuring my argument, and the version you are currently reading is probably not the structure I started with. I have settled on addressing just a few of the concerns I have encountered directly, before summarising some top tips I would recommend for keeping Book Day dress-up valuable and beneficial.
1. It is consumeristic nonsense which puts an unnecessary financial strain on parents.
Ok, this is persuasive. I completely accept and understand that parents feel pressure around dressing-up, and often ill-equipped to create or prepare an outfit. Who better to take advantage of this than the Great British High Street? To further hinder my argument, I have included some photographs taken in my local Matalan two days ago…
What can I say? However well-intentioned these shops may be (and I by no means believe that they are), they are clearly taking advantage of desperate families and making a mockery of the true meaning.
But then, what celebration isn’t tainted by consumerism’s poison? At what point is it acceptable to say that the baby and the bathwater are indistinguishable? Does the annual release of Easter Eggs into shops mean that I, as a Christian, dismiss the celebration of Easter (or, heaven forbid, chocolate)? Does the nation collectively decide each year to abandon the giving of gifts because Argos adverts take over our screens (in case anyone is interested, you can see my all-time favourite Argos advert HERE. Genius.)?
Perhaps these examples are not completely comparable; no analogy is perfect. However, to say that shops push a cynical interpretation of something, therefore the thing itself has no value, is a non-sequitur of the first degree. My position is that instead of admitting defeat to the supermarkets, we need to support children and families to be creative. Time for an anecdote, I think.
*Anecdote 1*
I can vividly remember two World Book Day experiences, both of which show that dress-up need not be costly (or even particularly creative…sorry Mum…). One year, donning a very normal jumper/shorts combo, I proudly dressed as my hero, Julian of Famous Five fame – more on this year later. My second experience, which due to the ever-thickening mists of time clouding my memory may have been earlier, was a last-minute special (I hope…sorry Mum…). Brandishing a bedsheet with a hole in the top, my mother approached me early in the morning with the wonderful news that I, a humble boy living on the poverty line in Essex, would be becoming royalty for one day only. I’m sure I was mortified at the time, but I now look back with pride on the day that I became the Bible’s favourite giant-slayer, King David.
My experience of working with parents, both as TA and Teacher, tells me that the overwhelmingly vast majority of parents want the very best for their children. If shops are telling them that they have to spend silly amounts of money on single-use costumes to help their child fit in, it is up to us as schools to tell them that they absolutely do not, and to model it! Instead of surrendering to a negative story, let’s promote a better one – you can take part in fulfilling, enjoyable dress-up days without caving in to consumerism’s demands. Many schools, including my own, invite parents in to work on projects throughout the year. If it is well-organised and timetabled sensitively, costumes, or parts of them, could even be created at school. Down with the showy, bought costumes; Long live King David!
2. Dressing-up does not promote a love of reading.
This is true, too. If I am going to moan about people making tenuous links as I did above, I must judge myself by the same measure. I would be foolish to make the argument that by forcing children and their families to prepare costumes which (hopefully) resemble book characters, children will fall in love with reading. If this were true, I would be marching up and down the country forcing strangers into Billericay Town FC replica shirts and watching our fanbase grow. If only it (either of those examples!) were that simple.
I’m doing a bad job of this aren’t I? I’m supposed to be in favour of dressing up for World Book Day! Ok, let me elaborate. I agree that dressing-up, in and of itself, does not promote a love of reading. But do the alternative ways of celebrating World Book Day do any better?
I have seen many ideas for celebrating World Book Day throughout the years. Recently, some on EduTwitter, including many I greatly admire, have taken to decorating potatoes as a substitute for wholesale dress-up. I have no reason to be against this. It certainly negates the possible downsides of Argument 1. However, could not Argument 2 be levelled against this idea too? It is a legitimate, creative way to celebrate books, but by itself it will not promote a love for reading any more than it will promote a love for the humble spud.
Can we take this further? Is there a single, standalone act, which can promote a love of reading? Does reading to children inherently promote this love? Having a well-stocked library? Teachers having a wide knowledge of children’s literature? How about an author visiting a school? No-one would argue that these activities are worthless. Indeed, I would be surprised if there was not a strong culture of reading in a place with all these elements embedded. My laboured point is that without intentionality, nothing, including dressing-up, can promote the love we seek. However, I would argue strongly that, used in the right way, dressing-up can absolutely contribute to a celebration of, and love for, books.
*Anecdote 2*
One of the best ways in which I have seen a school link dress-up to delving deeper into books is another example from my days as an Essex schoolboy. When dressed as Julian, I (along with the rest of my classmates) was led to a different class by my teacher. Whilst there, we were tasked with writing a poem involving both of our characters. This simple activity demanded that we not only know our own character well, but also that we could describe them to our partner. We also had to so ‘become’ our characters as to imagine how they would respond to being in an unfamiliar situation, with a wildly unfamiliar companion. Imagine what was going through the head of the poor, unprepared child having to imagine themselves hanging out with King David the previous year!
Of course, many children would struggle with the activity I so enjoyed above if they were wearing a generic, shop-bought costume. We will need to be encouraging children (and their families) to consider their character choice carefully. Something that I have said to my classes since qualifying as a teacher is, ‘the character is more important then the costume’. It is vital, I believe, for staff to take the lead in this, and dress as a character they relate to, or would like the children to relate to, even if the outfit is less impressive, so that when the day comes, the talk is more about the character than the costume (see below!). I still shudder when I think of a space-themed dress-up day in which huge swathes of both children and staff came in dressed as Stormtroopers from Star Wars. Throughout the day I was frequently asked ‘who are you meant to be?’ when proudly walking around in my homemade ‘The King Of Space’ costume. This leads me to one of my proudest moments as a teacher, which came in my NQT year.
*Anecdote 3*
As a class, we had been reading a greatly-acclaimed children’s novel which will remain nameless due to potential spoilers. (If you desperately want to know after reading this blog, I will link it HERE). In the run-up to World Book Day, when the author was due to vist us, I had been encouraging the children with simple costume ideas from the book. Some of these were as simple as saying, ‘you would make a great ___________’. When the day came, sadly sans author due to snow, not only had I come dressed as one of the characters from the book, in a very simple flat-cap and tweed jacket combo, but so had around a quarter of the class (more on a couple of these children later). The majority of the others donned costumes from books I know they had read throughout the year to that point, including from recent novels such as Lisa Thompson’s ‘The Light Jar’ – a dark outfit with riddles/clues stapled to it – and Abi Elphinstone’s ‘Dreamsnatcher’ – a red t-shirt, torn shorts and a bow made from sticks and string – again, both really simple yet meaningful costumes! These children were truly celebrating and loving books which had spoken to them.
3. Dressing-up for World Book Day is an unnecessary distraction from both learning and books.
Or, as it was expressed in a Metro opinion piece in February 2018, ‘…dressing up is not reading. Dressing up is a massive hoopla which distracts from the book aspect of World Book Day.’
This argument shares significant links with the first two points, to the extent that I considered deleting my response and squeezing it in above. However, I would go so far as to say that it is not only slightly different, but that it is a direct result of the other two arguments being believed. If we are saying that dressing-up has been reduced to which pre-made movie replica is on sale, and if we further posit that the activity does not indepedently promote a love of reading, it surely follows that it is at best irrelevant, or at worst a vanity project for the extroverted and competitive teachers/students/parents.
As I have made clear, I do not accept the first two arguments and so naturally do not subscribe to the third, following one. I would like to share two final anecdotes – one from my childhood and one from my teaching experience – in order to demonstrate how dressing-up can draw children completely into books.
*Anecdote 4*
One of the funniest moments of my short teaching career to date was the World Book Day I alluded to above in Anecdote 3. I taught a boy who was one of a set of triplets. His brothers declined to dress-up at all, whilst this child bucked the trend and came in a brilliant, simple, home-made costume linked to our novel, complete with little tools and props made of cardboard. He was utterly chuffed with himself, and received praise from both myself and his peers. I knew something he didn’t, however. We were only two chapters away from his character’s part in our novel reaching its end in the most permanent of ways. I did what any sensitive, caring teacher would do: I read the chapters. As his character was mentioned more and more, he drew increasingly more attention from his friends who had fully begun associating him with his fictional counterpart. And then it happened. His character made a final brave stand and heroically… died. Every eye turned to him, his mouth open in surprise. What should have been a sombre moment actually became quite comical, but it demonstrated something powerfully: my pupil had not simply dressed up as a character, he had become the character.
*Anecdote 5*
My final anecdote shows the power of dressing-up to exercise the opposite emotions, and comes once again from my own school days. We were instructed to take it in turns showing our book and describing both it and our character to the rest of our class. A boy in my year had dressed as a character from a picture book set in the trenches of World War One, and set about describing the plot. When he got to the end of his tale, he retold the ending in these exact words: ‘And it was actually really sad in the end because I died.’ The power of that pronoun has kept the memory fresh all these years later. Not, ‘he died,’ or ‘the character died.’ I died. I’m not convinced that any book has ever been more powerfully real to me than in that moment.
Final Thoughts:
The benefits of drama and role-play in the development of children’s literacy (and many other areas of education!) are rarely disputed. Why, then, are many teachers reluctant to throw themselves into the act of modelling these things in such a tailor-made way as World Book Day? I am but one person, but the five dress-up experiences I have detailed above have persuaded me of the benefits of donning a costume once a year, if embarked upon with thought and intentionality. If done with consideration for the legitimate, but for me ultimately unsatisfactory, reasons against dressing-up, I feel that it can be a powerful way of both developing and demonstrating children’s love for books, empathy for characters and creativity as part of a wide range of World Book Day events.
I will finish, as I promised above, by summarising some tips for promoting dressing-up as a way of celebrating books.
1. Be positive – there is no law anywhere which says we have to force children (or staff) to dress-up. If we choose to dress-up as a school, we must be positive about it! Speak about it with excitement. Share funny stories about previous experiences. If extrinsic motivation is required, hold a competition for home-made outfits or written rationales for older pupils. If children or parents don’t think we value it, what motivation will they have to do so?
2. Be proactive – if we do not support children and parents with dressing-up, they will take their cues from the supermarkets who, as we have agreed, care more about lining their pockets than promoting reading. Share ideas with the children or parents beforehand. My wife would confirm that I do not have a shred of artistic creativity. None. It’s tragic. We will have children and parents who feel that way about themselves and will cherish advice. They will not always ask for it.
3. Be personal – I mean this one in two ways. First, as with recommending reading, know your children. One year I prompted one of my girls that she would make a fantastic ‘Mrs Rust’ (a mechanical housekeeper) from Peter Bunzl’s ‘Cogheart‘, a comical, strong, distinctive character. I had no particular hopes – she was peak ‘I’m too cool for this’ age – but was thrilled when she arrived in a simple housekeeper’s outfit and completely owned the role all day. Had I not personally prompted her, we would not have had the success that we did. Second, talk to your children beforehand about books and characters they enjoy. Encourage the children that, as I shared above, ‘the character is more important than the costume’. And, as with all of teaching, model it! Share with the children the characters who move you, to whom you relate, who inspire you. An initially reluctant reader this year has told me she is planning to dress as Lucy Pevensie because she personally enjoyed the book and character, (and because, through book-talk, she knows I love it too!) not because Sainsbury’s (other supermarkets available…) have a sale on evacuee outfits.
4. Be prepared – with the best will in the world, some children will arrive in their school uniform having not had the chance to prepare a costume, or had the confidence to go through with one. Hopefully by Term 4 your class will have encountered a book with a child as the protagonist. So if, for example, a boy has got last-minute jitters about dressing as a member of a different gender and has simply arrived in their own clothes (yep, true story. It would have been amazing!), be ready to encourage them to think about characters they could associate themselves with that day. We must do all within our power to include everyone, not use the potential non-involvement of some to cancel the whole thing.
5. Be purposeful – for me, this is quite possibly the most important…or at least in the top five! In my opinion, dressing-up for World Book Day should be different from a regular non-uniform day (tangent: apparently these days are called other things elsewhere in the country. I’ve probably placed myself firmly in the South-East now!). I may do a future post with some of the best Book Day activities I have come across ready for 2021, God-willing, but in some ways the actual activity doesn’t matter a great deal. Fundamentally, our activities should encourage our children to fully take on the persona of the character or book they have dressed as. We must give children the opportunity to develop their creative empathy and, just for a while, live outside of their own experience. Is that not what so many of us love about reading? Dressing-up takes time and effort. Dressing-up demands preparation and potential messiness, both physical and potentially social and emotional. Dressing-up is not reading. But dressing-up can be one tool in bringing books to life for children and I, for one, will stand in its defence. That is my unpopular opinion.
I so hope this post has been useful for some as we enter World Book Week. I am not a big-name by any measure, but I am somebody who is passionate about reading for pleasure and using any tool in our kit to promote it. What has been your favourite World Book Day memory? Do you have any last-minute tips to share with your colleagues this week? Would you simply like to disagree with me? Do share your thoughts here or over on Twitter @MrBReading.
Mr B Reads 