2nd January Motivation and Inspiration Day

Motivation and Inspiration Day is celebrated on 2nd January in the United States of America. It is a day to sober up after all the festivities of New Year’s Eve and really get to work on resolutions. At the start of each new year, we all resolve that this is the year we will achieve our set goals and improve ourselves in general. So maybe, 2026 should also be the Year of Emotional Intelligence. After all, just as statistics show that people who read do better and earn more, statistics also show that people with high emotional intelligence do better and earn more after completing their education. Just as we teach reading as a subject at school, emotional intelligence can be taught.

This is the first four lines of a New Year poem by Jackie Kay. It is a perfect way to introduce what you think should be part of this year and your future.

Promise

by Jackie Kay

Remember, the time of year
when the future appears
like a blank sheet of paper
a clean calendar, a new chance.

From A Poem For Every Day Of The Year by Allie Esiri

Given the world extremes that students have been privy to recently, war, intolerance, racism, and the total disregard of others and their views, it is time to up the time spent on emotional intelligence, teaching empathy and about inclusion. The best way to do this is through circle time, class meetings, literature and strategies that enable students to understand different viewpoints.

The phrase 'a new year of kindness' has evolved from a hopeful sentiment into a structured intention for societal healing and emotional resilience. Unlike fleeting trends, it emphasises sustainable acts of care, inclusion, and active listening. It encourages individuals to reflect on how their words and actions impact others—not just during holidays but throughout the calendar year. What will you resolve to do with a clean calendar and a blank sheet of paper?

Emotional intelligence is not about being nice or kind all the time. It is about being self-aware enough to navigate discomfort and uncertainty, to connect without losing yourself. Vulnerability should not equate with weakness. 

At school we do a good job of ensuring students are in touch with their emotions and to know how to express them, but emotional intelligence is not about controlling emotions. It is about collaborating with them and using them to express empathy, to feel deeply and to make a difference for others.

There are five elements of Emotional Intelligence. One of them is empathy, but it is not enough on its own. There are many images online which provide a graphic for Emotional Intelligence. This is just one, but I like it  because it gives a brief detail about each of the elements.

Emotional Intelligence (EQ) plays an important role in mental health. It can help us build resilience, promote wellbeing, and develop emotional resilience.

Empathy and sympathy are not the same thing.

I am not saying 'empathy' is easy to teach, but I do think too many teachers put it in 'the-too-hard basket'. I find it very easy to read to and share books with my students that take them beyond their life and their comfort zone. Of course they may need scaffolding and I always ensure there is time for discussion. Questions I ask my students often are 'What is puzzling you?' and 'What are you wondering about?' as ways to understand what they are thinking about. 

The annual 

"Read for Empathy" booklist is announced in February by the non-profit EmpathyLab. I use these lists as research for my library shopping lists. I like the way it is divided into sections and age groups.

Similarly, Inclusive Books for Children provide wonderful annotated lists which will help teachers and teacher-librarians match their SEL (social-emotional learning) needs to the right books.

Book sites like these are extremely helpful as they mean teachers get to know what is new and appropriate. Otherwise there is a tendency to fall back on books they know from their own education and students miss out on what is new and pertinent.

1st January 2026 The Year of Reading

Happy New Year from Alison Lester in Fish Creek and me in Sydney.

In the Chinese Zodiac, it is The Year of the Horse.

The United Nations The UN has declared 2026 as three International Years: the International Year of the Woman Farmer, focusing on gender equality in agriculture; the International Year of Volunteers for Sustainable Development, celebrating volunteer impact; and the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists, highlighting sustainable land use. These observances aim to raise global awareness, promote action, and empower communities and individuals working in these vital areas for sustainable development. 

Each year in the library, we usually start the displays with something connected to the Year being celebrated, such as the Year of the Horse for 2026 on the Chinese Zodiac, or the Year of Volunteers as proposed by the United Nations for 2026, but the year that I think is the one we should be celebrating, is the one that the U.K. is celebrating, The Year of Reading. The UK campaign brings together a range of partner organisations, from publishers and Government departments to Literacy charities.

Reading for pleasure in the UK is in sharp decline, with only 

50% of adults reading regularly—a 13.8% drop since 2015—and just 1 in 3 children (32.7%) enjoying reading in their free time, the lowest in two decades. Key drivers include social media, lack of time, and reduced engagement among young adults and boys.   Like here in Australia, the UK has changed the way they teach reading in schools. They put more 

emphasis on the strategies espoused by the Science of Reading (SoR) research and their five 

pillars of Early Literacy Skills.

In the process they downplayed Reading for Pleasure, the role of the school library and the importance of reading with other enabling adults such as parents.  Now that they have realised their folly, once again there is a 'big push' in the UK for schools to ensure they have Reading for Pleasure as a clear outcome for students. Teachers are being trained to heed the Reading for Pleasure research. Here in Australia we need to do that too. We need to stop the school systems, and schools who feel they no longer need a school library, a trained teacher librarian or any form of Reading for Pleasure program before it is done and becomes impossible to reinstate.

Reading isn’t just a hobby; it’s a powerful tool linked to stronger writing skills, better well-being, and even higher lifetime earnings. In fact, research shows that children who become proficient readers can earn substantially more over their lifetime.

By making reading a daily habit, we can help lay the foundation for strong literacy skills and ensure every child has the opportunity to thrive. Schools and parents owe this to children and one of the easiest ways to do this is to model reading. They need to make time and value that reading to children time.

Of course this will not be easy to do, but the longer we do not espouse Reading for Pleasure and put school strategies into place to make sure it happens, the harder it will be. The UK plan has lots of ideas to offer Australian teachers and teacher librarians for parent information sessions, ideas for school staff meetings and ideas to use in the classroom.

If reading is to become a lifelong habit then people must see themselves as participants in a community that views reading as a significant and enjoyable activity. Overall, the research highlights:

• Children who know adults who read for pleasure take it for granted that reading is a valuable and worthwhile activity (Csikszentmihalyi, 1991)
• The home environment exerts a significant effect on academic motivation, which is over and above that predicted by socio-economic status (Gottfried, Fleming & Gottfried, 1998). Thus, children whose home environment is more cognitively stimulating have higher academic motivation than children whose home is lacking such stimulation
• Parents who believe that reading is a source of entertainment have children with more positive views about reading than parents who only emphasise the skills aspect of reading (e.g. Sonnenschein et al., 2000)
• Children of parents who believed that reading is a source of pleasure had greater reading motivation scores in primary school (Baker & Scher, 2002) and
• Children are more likely to continue to be readers in homes where books and reading are valued (Baker & Scher, 2002).

Yes, this a 'hotchpotch' of my thinking, but as I plan for the school year ahead, I am as adamant as always that the key to school success lies with a school executive, teacher librarians, and teachers who read, value reading and promote reading to their stakeholders.

Let's do it!