In pictures: Your World Book Day photos

Pupils across the borough settled down to good yarns and sometimes became their favourite literary characters as they celebrated World Book Day.

At Wood Fold Primary youngsters in Standish all came in their night attire for storytime, while Ashton’s Nicol Mere Primary children donned woodland character costumes.

Young shoppers were also read tales in a storytime tent at Wigan’s Galleries shopping centre.

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Results from the annual National Literacy Trust survey, which gathered data from schools across the UK, reveals that nearly half of children aged eight to 11 are not reading with someone outside of school, a figure which increases to nearly 80 per cent across the full school age range.

The results are despite the fact that over half of those who read at home say it helps them to feel calm, as well as evidence showing that children who don’t read with someone at home enjoy reading less. This problem is even more pronounced for those receiving free school meals.

The survey shows an urgent need to encourage shared reading, given its direct impact on reading enjoyment, and indications that children who enjoy reading more do better at school - children and young people who enjoy reading very much are three times as likely to read above the level expected for their age.

In response, World Book Day has launched a three-year campaign to get children and adults to Share A Story and read with children for just 10 minutes a day to help form reading habits, cement a love of reading and reverse this worrying trend.

View our gallery of some of the pictures sent in by our Facebook readers.

More pictures in Saturday’s Wigan Post and next week’s Wigan Observer.