Being crazy, I have signed up to take part in The Very Group Firewalk to raise money for our corporate charity, Beanstalk. Beanstalk work with children who need support to develop a love of reading. (More details below.)

So on the 30th November, I will walk over hot coals for a good cause! Please sponsor me to help share a love of books, make myself look daft, and possibly set myself on fire! ;-)

Coram Beanstalk wants all children to choose to read. Evidence shows that when we read because we want to not because we are being told to or feel we have to it makes a significant difference to how successful we are in education, how good we feel and how well we do in life. Coram Beanstalk have been putting a 'reading for pleasure' approach to work since 1973: they were doing it successfully long before it rightly came to such prominence across academic and educational settings. For children to choose to be read to and to read themselves, they need the experience to be positive: enjoyable, satisfying, and involving and for what they are being asked to do to be within their grasp. Put simply, Coram Beanstalk equips people to 'do reading' better with children because the more children encounter confident, capable and inspiring support with their reading at home, in school and in life the more they are likely to get on and stay on the path to becoming a reader.