Launching a love of reading: our Early Years Rocket Pack with Rob Biddulph
We are excited to announce our latest Rocket Pack, curated in partnership with award-winning children’s author and illustrator, Rob Biddulph! Designed especially for the Early Years, this edition is exclusively for schools who receive, our Story Starter Programme Packs.
As we follow the journey of young readers through our Mind the Gap campaign, we are reminded of how vital it is to nurture a love of reading from the very start. Rocket Packs provide schools with high-quality reading resources to help build rich reading environments – and, as Rob reminds us, this is most powerful when it’s supported by positive reading experiences at home too.
Discover more about Rob’s background, his creative process and his advice for promoting reading for pleasure, in this exclusive interview.
Kickstarting a new care through family story time
Rob is now a multi-award-winning author and illustrator of many children’s books. He was named Illustrator of the Year at the British Book Awards in 2025 and was the official World Book Day Illustrator from 2019 to 2021. Rob was the official World Book Day Author in 2024, and has written 16 picture books, 12 ‘Draw With Rob’ activity books and four chapter books – with many more to come! His #DrawWithRob series broke the Guiness World Record for the largest online art class in 2020, reaching 45,611 households.
Despite this success, Rob’s journey into the world of children’s books didn’t begin straight away. After studying illustration, he moved into graphic design and went on to work as the art director for the Observer Magazine, NME, Sky and Just Seventeen. It wasn’t until he had his own children that storytelling came back into focus. “When my children were young and I started buying lots of picture books to read to them at bedtime, that’s when it all came back to me and I thought… I think I might be able to do that.”
“I didn’t really know how to do it,” Rob admits, “but sometimes, you’ve just got to try these things, right? And I haven’t really looked back since.”
Behind the scenes of Rob’s story making
Rob’s background in magazines still shapes how he approaches creating his stories. He starts each new book by visualising its cover. “That’s what we were taught on magazines, you get your cover and you work backwards from there because that’s how your reader experiences it.”
From there, he’ll sketch out the cover image “because quite often that gives me the main character,” before switching to the words of the story – writing the words “just like writing a poem.”
“The words get finished first and then the illustrations come at the end,” explains Rob, as he’ll often draw out each book three times to get to the final version.
Letting the story choose the style
Rob’s books feature a wide range of illustration styles, driven by the type of story itself. While comedy stories might call for “very bold, very simple illustrations,” more “poetic” books – like I Follow the Fox – suit a more “painterly fashion.”
“I don’t want to ever rest on my laurels. I’m constantly changing. I’m never really happy with anything I do, which I think is a very important part of being a creative person. The moment you’re like, ‘that’s it, I can never do better than this,’ you might as well hang up your pencil”.
Zooming in: A look at “When I Grow Up I’d Like to Be”
Rob’s latest Early Years book, When I Grow Up I’d Like to Be, explores the many dreams children have for their futures – from gardener to sailor, footballer to ballet dancer.
Inspired by aspirations shared with him at live events, the book celebrates “the enthusiasm with which children embrace their futures.” But, as Rob explains, the message of the book isn’t about what job you choose – “it’s about the journey. The most important thing to be when you grow up is happy.”
Mind the Gap: why reading matters for every child’s future
Our Mind the Gap campaign highlights the different life paths, careers and possibilities that open up through strong literacy skills. We want all children to be able to access any future they can imagine.
Parental engagement is a key part of making this happen – a sentiment that Rob, as an official ambassador for the National Year of Reading, shares. For him, bedtime stories are “unbelievably important in developing a child’s love of reading.”
“When you really dive into a story together, it’s a really fantastic way of bonding and creating memories with your children… and so I always say to parents, if you don’t [read stories with your child] you’re really missing out on something for yourself too.”
“I think one mistake that some parents make is that they’re too prescriptive about what books their children read,” says Rob. Choice is important as it stops reading becoming “a chore and something that the child feels they have to do. That’s when the love of reading will start to die.”
“We want them to have a love of reading… it’s developing a curious mind, a hungry mind. That’s what the benefit of reading for pleasure is”
Ensuring every child can access stories
“I always say that a library is a room full of doors. Every single book is a doorway into another world.”
Stories like Rob’s help children imagine new futures – and good literacy gives them the tools to access them. “Every child, no matter their social status, their parent’s social status or their financial background, needs access to books,” he says – a belief we wholeheartedly share.
We are incredibly excited for children to receive our Early Years Rocket Pack, curated by Rob – and to begin their own journey into reading for pleasure.
