World Book Day

World book day has become one of the most popular days in the whole school year. It began in 1995 and was originally compiled by UNESCO. They wanted to make a worldwide celebration of reading and books. This fantastic day is now celebrated in over 100 countries worldwide, and is incredibly popular with both students and teachers. The whole day is filled with initiatives and events to get children interested, and involved with books and reading. All of the children love dressing up as their favorite character from their most enjoyed book.

Although the date of the event does differ from country to country, the concept remains the same all over the world. This is to allow the world book day to fall within term time, and these vary in different countries. Although there is a huge amount of children all over the world that read books, they need to learn to fully embrace them. Reading is an amazing experience that takes you on a journey through your imagination. Far too many children these days are caught up in the technology side of life, and forget about the simple pleasures such as reading.

To encourage more children to explore their local bookstores, book tokens are distributed amongst the children. The tokens offer a small monetary amount off the books that are purchased, hoping to encourage both children and parents into the bookstore. However, the joy of actually encouraging the children into the bookstore in the first place is a far greater reward. Once children experience the amazing joy that reading gives them, you will find they will continue to enjoy reading throughout their lives.

A huge part of the day for many children is the excuse to dress up as their favorite literary character. Children love dressing up and role playing, and buying world book day costumes allows them to do this with all of their friends. Finding the right type of costume can be a challenge, as some children's choices are complex and expensive.  Although as parents, we all like to see our children dressed as something of relevance to books and reading. For children they see their costume choice through completely different eyes. They will want the costume to be fun, funky, and someone that all of their friends will recognize easily.

Although historical characters are great and do have a large amount of meaning, to a class room of children the meaning behind the costume may be lost. You need to choose a costume that doesn't make your child feel embarrassed or strange.  Popular children's books thankfully do offer a great range of characters to choose from. Enid Blyton and Ronald Dahl characters are fun and easy to create. The characters from Narnia, Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan, all enable you to find a great costume that won't break the bank.  

If the choice is up your child they are very likely to choose one of these characters, however some schools will theme the event. This can become more difficult to find the right costume especially if the theme is historical or classic books. Thankfully, a lot of schools leave the decision up to the children, making it far easier on the parents. World book day is a fantastic event that encourages children to talk about and enjoy books.