I CAN still remember the feel of the paper, colours, font, texture, even the smell of my old Hector’s House annual.

To anyone who wasn’t a child of the Seventies, Hector (a dog in a hat) and chums Zsazsa (a cat in a dress) and Kiki (a frog in a gingham smock) shared a house in a kooky children’s TV series. It was one of those comforting five-minute animated/puppet shows that preceded the teatime News, along with The Magic Roundabout, The Clangers and Ludwig, which was frankly weird, but I digress...

My Hector’s House annual was a spin-off from the programme, and I can vividly recall the tactile experience of opening up the book.

Reading is more than just following words. It’s a tactile, sensory experience, encompassing touch, smell and emotion. I still remember the covers and feel of paperbacks I read as a child, and how I felt as the stories inside unfolded.

As a child, with heightened senses, that rounded experience of reading - books, comics, even the back of a cereal packet - has lifelong consequences. For me, enjoying the feel and the look of books created a love of reading.

While I appreciate the convenience of eBooks, I think for children particularly it’s terribly important to have the tactile experience of reading, rather than staring glass-eyed into a screen.

This week I read about a scheme offering “reading remedies” to help children through difficult times. To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee and Mr Stink by David Walliams are among the books to “help kids cope in a post-Trump world”, according to bibliotherapists Ella Berthoud and Susan Elderkin, who say good stories can ease growing pains and fears. Their School Of Life project, drawing on their experiences of parenthood, helps parents and children through issues including eating disorders, bullying and self-harm.

Children are naturals at “being their own bibliotherapist”, says Susan Elderkin. Picking up a book and becoming engrossed in a story shows they’re not alone; it reflects situations other people have been in too which, adds Susan, is “hugely comforting to a child”.

At a time when children will be aware of a new world order, with some picking up on parents’ anxieties, and a prevailing mood of uncertainty about the future, stories are more important than ever. They play a huge role with easing fears, or allowing children to confront them in a controlled way. Dystopian fiction such as William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, also on the aforementioned Top Ten, confront the notion of coping with disaster. “These books are about taking responsibility, children taking the future into their hands,” says Elderkin.

For me it was the Famous Five. They were sensible and Home Counties, a world away from my classroom on a West Yorkshire council estate, and that’s why I loved them. They went to boarding school, they were independent and resourceful. Yes, their adventures were dated, even back when I was reading them, but I owe my lifelong love of reading to them.

It goes without saying that literacy is a vital life skill; linked not only to educational and employment prospects, but also emotional development. Organisations like Beanstalk, training volunteer reading helpers for schools, and Imagine, sending free books to pre-school children in the Canterbury and Manningham areas of Bradford, are doing fantastic work in instilling a love of books among infants.

I hope that, as well as reading, children love books for being books, and all the sensory delights that come with them.

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