Share A Story Month 2024

Posted: 2nd May 2024

This month is National Share A Story Month, organised by the Federation of Children’s Book Groups. It’s a celebration of the power of storytelling and story sharing, and an all-round brilliant initiative that encourages reading.

Why Read?

Reading is for everyone – regardless of age – and it has such massive benefits for little ones. It’s difficult to carve out uninterrupted one-on-one time with them, away from buzzing phones, loud siblings and the general level of mayhem that reigns in most busy family households.

But reading is the best way to build confidence, expand vocabulary, feed the imagination, foster empathy and have fun together. Yet fewer than half of 0-2 year olds are read to every day or nearly every day, and a staggering 400,000 little ones in the UK don’t have books at home.

So, if there’s one thing to make time for today, it’s to sit down and read together.

How to get involved

The theme of this year’s Share A Story Month is ‘a feast of stories’, a celebration of food, wondrous creations and delicious delectables that we find in stories. From cream buns to hot chocolates, magical pizzas to fizzing drinks and everything in between.

We love this theme as it reminds us how authors invoke all the senses in their stories – from delicious smells wafting from an oven to the design of sugary sweets, the sounds of whipped cream being sprayed on a hot chocolate, and the feeling of fizzy drinks on the tongue.

The options are endless – there are so many wonderful tales to fire up the imagination – so if it’s all a bit baffling, there’s a list of recommended reading that spans from toddlers to teens. How many of these have you read with your little ones?

Explorers+ classes often have a story to introduce new ideas to children

Read with us

Reading is very much part of the Gymboree Play & Music experience. Story time plays a key role in our Pre-schooler Family Play, Explorers Plus and Pre-school Steps classes, and is a lovely way to bring a busy, fun-filled class to a close.

We aim to gently guide little ones towards school readiness, working to a custom-designed curriculum that challenges your little one as they grow.

Above all, it’s about coming together as a class and having fun. So you can expect some great stories in class this month.

“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more you learn, the more places you’ll go.” – Dr Seuss

child development, classes, reading, wellbeing

Reviews

Both of my children (3.5 years and 11 months) go to Gymboree Play & Music and love it. My toddler goes to their drop-off Lego class which she raves about. It's very creative, working not only on Lego skills but also painting, drawing etc. My infant son loves his Gymboree Play & Music Crawlers class - particularly loves crawling all over their props, through the tunnels, etc. Great way to get the infant crawling over obstacles! Gymboree Play & Music is part of our weekly schedule for both kids and we look forward to participating every week. Invaluable!

Natalia, Hampstead

Gymboree Play & Music was a lovely and positive experience for my son Leo. We started when he was 9 months and he is now 3 years old, I wish we had started sooner.
He loves the songs (which is part of our daily singing at home), the freedom to explore and he was happy there. He looks forward to class every week and once class is over he will tell everyone about Gymbo and what he did.
For me, I liked that it taught him how to get down safely from a height, how to learn to use his body, and touching on different topics every 2 weeks. It gave me confidence in other environments to trust that he has the ability that he learned from Gymboree Play & Music and to trust him.

Sheena, Sevenoaks

I’ve been taking both my newborn and toddler to Gymboree Play & Music for a couple of months now and both boys are really loving the classes and open gym sessions. It’s a great way to meet other mums, entertain toddlers at witching hour(!) and get ideas for sensory play with babies. Sophie and Cat are fantastic and have so much energy and loads of different ideas for the classes, plus make sure the activities it’s help children meet their development milestones as well. Highly recommend this if you’re thinking about joining!! Thanks so much Sophie, Cat and the wider team :-)

Pippa, Tunbridge Wells