A few days ago I welcomed Alice and Jerry to my house!
New pupils ?
Oh no!
Characters in a book?
Yes...
all the way from the good old USA!
Having searched for one of these books for ages, I've finally got my hands on one.
Take a look and you will see something very similar in these book covers.
***
The Alice and Jerry books were actually a very successful American reading scheme for children, which James Mackenzie Wood, a director of British publisher James Nisbet, encountered in 1946.
His wife, Rona Munro, a teacher, produced her own version, which were published in 1949.
Enter..
JANET AND JOHN
***
Janet and John books became hugely popular and influential in the teaching of schoolchildren throughout the 1950s and 1960s.
Janet and John were portrayed as average English children, living a typical middle-class life, and the books consisted of stories that progressively incorporated key words needed in the development of reading skills.
And...
The stories were illustrated by Florence and Margaret Hoopes...the very same illustrators as for the Alice and Jerry books!
However...
By the 1970s, Janet and John’s straightforward and simple world was seen as being hopelessly outdated and the books fell out of favour...
BUT...
Have remained as icons with those who grew up with them.
So...for my giveaway...just comment saying which reading scheme/books helped you learn to read.
;-)