download the Marvel Comics app and set up a free account. Another brilliant choice for comic book fans is The Pheonix Comic, which offers a few free digital sample issues online.

Non-fiction fans might enjoy Cicada Publishing’s Earth Shattering Events – an appealing non-fiction book about natural disasters, which has been recently made available as a free PDF book for children to read during lockdown. Publisher DK has also created an excellent home learning hub, which includes free access to full colour spreads from a number of their popular non-fiction titles. Another good source for non-fiction is BookLife’s selection of free non-fiction titles made available as PDF books (a popular starting point is this fact book about space), which parents can access by creating a free account. For poetry fans, we recommend Children’s Poetry Archive as the best place to listen to or read along with an incredible bank of children’s poetry, searchable by theme or poet.

There are also some brilliant children’s magazines available, and most offer sample issues to read online. Why not try the free digital issues of Scoop Magazine, Aquilla, Whizz Pop Bang, The Week Junior or National Geographic Kids?

 Storytime Online hub. The QR codes and links in the document link to story readings on Youtube and all of the books we’ve chosen are read aloud by their fabulous authors and illustrators.

Audible Stories has made a bank of children’s stories in a number of languages available to listen to for free, including Harry Potter, Kid Normal, Winnie the Pooh and The Tales of Beatrix Potter.

Oxford Owl is a popular recommendation. Once parents have created a free account , readers can access a host of books. The books are available to filter by age group, text type, book band, phonics phase or reading level. A similar resource is Collins Connect, which offers free access to 330+ Collins Big Cat ebooks from pink to lime level, including worksheets and quizzes to use at home.