Across the UK and Ireland, children are today being encouraged to participate in activities that celebrate reading and writing through activities in schools, libraries and youth organisations.

One of the most popular activities included in World Book Day is the sale of £1/€1.50 books. Retailers across the nations carry a stock of specially selected children’s books sold for the low price to tempt youngsters to try out new material.

Every child in the region is entitled to a £1/€1.50 token that they can use to buy the books at selected retailers and pop-up shops at schools. Books in the offer this year include ones featuring Paddington, Pokémon, and Bluey. There are also two books in Gaelic and Welsh, respectively.

For many parents in the UK and Ireland, World Book Day can be a dreaded event, however, as children are often asked to dress up as their favourite book characters for school. Annually the British press is awash with stories on putting together last-minute outfits to fit their children’s whims. Fortunately, the official World Book Day website provides their own “low-cost dressing up pack” for parents looking for inspiration.

Reading between the lines

Schools will also put on programmes to celebrate reading, as figures from the National Literacy Trust (NLT) show the activity has dropped in popularity in recent years.

Annual NLT research found the lowest number of children reading for pleasure in the UK last year since 2019. For the first time since the NLT started surveying listening habits, more children said they preferred listening to books (42.3%) over reading them (34.6%).

On the results, the NLT has said that “children and young people’s levels of reading and writing enjoyment are in crisis, with quite dramatic decreases in levels of both over the last year alone.” In response, the charity is campaigning for more use of audiobooks in the national curriculum.

In 2019, World Book Day commissioned the NLT to conduct research into the impact of the event. While many children spoke positively of access to books, some didn’t have access to libraries and needed more financial support to read. Nearly 3 in 10 (28%) children aged 8 to 11 receiving free school meals said the book they ‘bought’ with their World Book Day token had been the first book of their own.

Of the children surveyed, they all appreciated the book token scheme. One participant said: “They are a very good idea because if there’s this book that you want, but you can’t afford it or your parents just won’t let you get it unless it’s for free, then you can get this token and say, well, now I can get any book for free, so I might as well get one.”

Two days, one mission

World Book Day is a UNESCO-organised event that has been run on 23 April since 1995. Every year a different city is selected as the World Book Day Capital City. Last year, Strasbourg in north-eastern France was chosen, while Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro has the honour in 2025.

The UK and Ireland’s World Book Day is a separate event set up in the UK to work alongside the global UNESCO event. First launched in 1998 by then-UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, the first Thursday of March was picked so the programme didn’t clash with Easter school holidays in the UK.

Alongside World Book Day, the UK government is also partnering with other schemes to promote reading. These include Start for Life which is encouraging “families to chat, play and read with their child from birth” as well as a UK-Ukraine school partnerships programme, where “pupils will explore reading as a tool to build literacy skills, cross-cultural understanding, expand horizons, and boost confidence and wellbeing.”