The 2019 men’s Rugby Union World Cup is taking place – in Japan – this autumn.

If you are a sport-loving family, now is a good time to try to engage your children with reading for pleasure – through sport. Fiction. Non-fiction. Websites. Newspapers. Magazines. Whatever you choose, the Rugby World Cup can help. 

I am a children’s author who came to love reading through sport.
I now write sport fiction for a living. These are my ten top tips to encourage your sports mad children to read for pleasure.

1 Set the home page on your computer to a decent rugby website like www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union or www.rugbyworldcup.com

2 Get your children on form for the year with one of the guides to playing the game. Know the Game: Rugby Union is a great book to start with. Ask if your local library stocks it.

3 Deliver a newspaper’s rugby supplement to your child’s room on Saturday or Sunday morning to get them used to reading previews, match reports and other articles.

4 Buy them a copy of one of the popular rugby magazines, Rugby World or The Rugby Paper.

5 Read together a child-friendly player-autobiography full of statistics, pictures and childhood stories. Check first that the content is appropriate for kids. A popular one is by Jonny Wilkinson.

6 Play one of the fantasy World Cup games running in newspapers, requiring a close eye on who is injured and who has been dropped from teams. Another reason to read the rugby pages.

7 Discover superb fiction in libraries and bookshops : Rugby Zombie by Dan Anthony, Rugby Spirit by Gerard Siggins Pride & Penalties by Chris Higgins and my Rugby Academy series.

8 Leave rugby newspaper articles and match reports in regular places like on the fridge door.

9 Check out the RFU’s free literacy resources at www.englandrugby.com. Check out the other home nations’ websites too: www.scottisrugby.org, www.wru.co.uk and www.irisrgby.ie.

10 Try reading more yourself. You’ll enjoy it and your children will want to join in too