Tutor Reading Programme

Reading for Pleasure at West Somerset College

We value reading for pleasure at West Somerset College and encourage our students to do the same. Our reading programme takes place each Monday and Friday morning during tutor time and offers all students in Year 9 and Year 10 the opportunity to read and enjoy a book together with their tutor.

Our Tutor Reading Programme

Whilst undertaking tutor reading, students will not be required to study the texts or complete work set based on them; they will be asked only to follow the text as it is read to them, and to listen, enjoy and discuss the topics raised as appropriate.

Each tutor group will cover at least four texts across the year and all texts have been chosen in order to introduce students to a range of perspectives and ideas they may not experience in everyday life or through their independent reading.

Many of the texts cover sensitive topics such as race, bereavement, gender, equality, violence, discrimination, mental health, war, politics and religion. As such, our Tutor Reading Programme is designed to be both a window and a mirror: each book is carefully selected to allow students to hold a mirror up to their own selves through the rich and wonderful texts that they read, while also reflecting upon their own thoughts, feelings, and place within the world.

It is also intended that these texts become a window out into the world of wider human experiences, different customs and beliefs as well as new and enriching knowledge which will unlock more windows and doors for them in the future.

Year 9 Tutor Reading Programme

Book Titles and Authors

• Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
• I Am David by Anne Holm
• Lord of the Flies by William Golding
• Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman
• One by Sarah Crossman
• Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo
• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon
• The Giver by Lois Lowry
• The Science of Breakable Things by Tae Keller
• Tomorrow, when the war began by John Marsden
• Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
• Wonder by R.J Palacio

Year 10 Tutor Reading Programme

Book Titles and Authors

• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
• All the light we cannot see by Anthony Doerr
• Animal Farm by George Orwell
• Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
• How I live now by Meg Rosoff
• Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
• The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo
• The Lie Tree by Frances Hardinge
• The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness
• The Sky is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson
• The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
• Where the World Ends by Geraldine McCaughrean

Our Aspirations for the Programme

We sincerely hope that your child enjoys the texts that they are currently, and will be, reading as part of our Tutor Reading Programme.