A child-led research team of several children and their teacher source reading materials that better represent their realities (cultural, social, and linguistic), exploring the impact onreading engagement and enjoyment. The research question was explored through methods designed by a child-led research team – a series of child-led interviews and questionnaires, with the intent to ensure a more authentic pupil voice. The research methods created an ethos of ownership and empowerment over the children’s literacy choices in school. There is much literature supporting the need for a diverse range of reading resources in schools that appropriately reflect learners’ lived experiences and realities. However, there is less research available examining this in diverse rural areas of Wales – our school context – and conducted through child-led research methodology.  Using these findings, books were sourced for the school reading areas across years 4-6. In the second stage of the research process, we explored the impact of this on reading engagement through further qualitative data collection methods. Findings show that the children feel there is a need to diversify their reading resources to better reflect their realities and lived experiences, and the reading materials consequently impacted positively on their reading enjoyment in school.

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