I feel very fortunate that I chanced to find L2L2R

Keith has been a volunteer with Learn to Love to Read since 2023. Here he talks about his experience as a volunteer helping young children with their reading and how he feels supported as an L2L2R volunteer.

"After retiring from work, I wanted to participate in some voluntary work that would be supportive of my local community and hopefully, personally rewarding. I had been a volunteer for two years helping Year 6 children in reading and comprehension exercises when COVID abruptly ended that role, and post-pandemic I was looking to get back into supporting children’s literacy.

"I wasn’t sure what to expect reading with much younger children than I had in the past, but reading with Year 1 and 2 children is an absolute joy, which gets better as the weeks progress and you get to know one another. The phonemes and word blending training from L2L2R I found to be invaluable, and the main thing is to make the sessions fun for the children; not just listening to their reading, but sharing reading with them, letting the child choose a book they want to have read to them, talking about the stories, what they’d do if they were in the story.  A child’s imagination is boundless.

"It’s lovely to follow the improvement in the confidence and fluency of a child's reading, and particularly the expression they put into the text. 

"I feel very fortunate that I chanced to find L2L2R through a simple internet search. I was impressed with L2L2R’s model of closely partnering with local schools, which means volunteers are welcomed by school staff as part of that partnership. The support volunteers receive by way of initial training and subsequent ad hoc sessions is excellent and the regular social gatherings and events L2L2R arrange for volunteers really builds a sense of community. Those meet-ups are also great opportunities to share and learn from other volunteers' experiences. I’d certainly recommend L2L2R to anyone interested in helping children develop their reading ability."