Do your children have a favourite story? One that they like to hear over and over again?

You probably already know that stories are powerful teaching tools, particularly with younger learners.

But did you know that the new edition of Classic Tales now makes it even easier to bring the magic of good storytelling into your English classroom?

Use this award-winning series to effortlessly enrich your English lessons with practice in the four key skills – reading, writing, speaking, and listening.

Reading
Children find the much-loved stories irresistible. Vibrant, colour illustrations on every page bring the stories to life and make it easy for them to follow the narrative. They love looking for the details and finding their favourite characters. A picture dictionary or illustrated glossary helps them with the meaning of key words.

Writing
The Storybooks support writing through comprehension activities, and the Activity Books offer a range of extra writing exercises, helping you to make the most of the language presented to students.

Speaking
The short play in every Activity Book and Play re-uses the same language. There is support for teachers on how to speak the play in class and how to perform the play for an audience.

Students can perform the play for the rest of the class, for other classes, or even the whole school. The play can also be used for a parents’ evening or drama competition.

Listening
Every e-Book includes the complete recorded text. Children can consolidate their understanding of the story by listening to the audio version in American English. If you use the e-Book on an Interactive Whiteboard, the whole class can watch and listen together.

Reading is a valuable learning tool and can greatly help your young learners practise, reinforce and improve their language skills but it can be difficult to use reading in the classroom.

How can I get my students to read?, How can I make reading a classroom activity?, and how can I be sure they understand what they’ve read? are common questions teachers ask and we’re here to help with the Oxford Big Read Junior.

These short, simple, and practical tips will help you get all of your young learners reading and using what they have read in group work and short projects. We also have easy ways for parents to help support their children’s reading. Students get excited about reading, your whole class gets involved and you know they’ve understood what they’ve read.

Join the Oxford Teachers’ Club for free and the Oxford Big Read Junior will help you get your whole class reading.