When getting my nose in a book cured most things short of school...

An apt quotation from Philip Larkin's "A Study of Reading Habits" - it both summarises my week and links nicely on from my previous post.

I often find myself wondering what it might be like to have time to read whenever I fancied or to work in an environment involving more reading.  Most people would argue that working as an English teacher would provide plenty of opportunities to read each day alas, this is not the case.  Most of the reading I do at work is either class texts (that I have read at least once before) or a pupil's work.  When reading pupils' jotters I have my marking brain on and usually have to switch quickly between styles and genres.

This time of year is always super busy and heavy on the marking load.  Between prelim marking, folio deadlines and extra study homework there is very little time left to read for pleasure.  This lead me to thinking of the strategies I use to squeeze in some reading time each day.  They are by no means groundbreaking but I find myself more and more grateful for the timeout from everything each day.

One of the first things I do in the morning is turn on my current audiobook.  It gives me a chance to "read" something while I shower, get dressed and generally potter around the house. While it is probably not conducive to a speedy morning routine it does afford me time to set my brain to function for the day ahead. Some mornings, when I have had a good sleep and feel energised (read: barely ever) I am ready with enough time to sit down with a cup of tea and a book before the time I leave for work.  As this is a rarity I definitely am grateful for audiobooks.

My drive to work continues with my audiobook but when I get to work I usually have a bit of down time to get a chapter or two of whatever physical book I am reading.  I am usually the first one from my department to arrive so the staff base is a quiet place to start the day.  My junior classes start every period of English with 10 minutes of personal reading time and I always read with them.  It models good reading habits and lets them see the value of reading time.  I really enjoy it and it starts the lesson off in a really quiet and calm way.

On my way home from work, depending on how the day has gone, I put my audiobook back on or sometimes listen to a podcast.  When I am home and cooking the dinner or pottering around the house there is always an audiobook playing from my phone.  I try to set aside a quiet time each night to read in my reading room but that depends on how much marking I have left to do.  I never set myself targets of a number of pages to get through or how many chapters to read because this is real life and sometimes reality just gets in the way.

In our current house I am lucky enough to get the use of the spare room as an office and reading space.  It is home to all of my books (or at least the ones that haven't found themselves dotted around elsewhere!) and my comfy reading chair.  It is full of fairy lights, candles and reading paraphernalia.  It always smells amazing because of the candles everywhere and is home to 3 of our guinea pigs who keep me company when I am working, reading or meditating.  It is a little sanctuary for me and it definitely helps me to focus more on my reading.

This week I have had quite a productive reading week.  I have now finished "The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock" by Imogen Hermes Gower and started another of the Women's Prize longlisted books; "When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife" by Meena Kandasamy.  I also finished "The Belles" by Dhonielle Clayton on Audible and have started the second book in the "Frey and McGrey" series by Oscar de Muriel, "Fever in the Blood" - all of the hysterical laughter at the narrator's Scottish accent attempt is really making my week better!  I am currently looking into the longlist books for my Kindle so that I have them all in one place for my holibobs next week.

In memory of the wonderful Stephen Hawking, this week I will end on a remark he made:

"Look up at the stars and not down at your feet.  Try to make sense of what you see, and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious."