A classroom reading challenge, with no platform to buy

You can now make your own reading challenge on Peabody: pick what counts (books, days with reading on them, or the Book Bingo card), set the finish line for each age, choose the dates, and you get one link and a QR poster for your class, library or family. Your readers open it on their own devices and get the same tracker as Peabody's own challenges. It is free, like the rest of Peabody through the end of 2026, and it collects nothing about the children: there is no class list to upload and no account to make.

Make a challenge, or read on for why it works the way it does.

Why a teacher can't just start one

The big reading-challenge platforms are sold to a district or a library system, priced by a quote. A single teacher who wants a January goal for twenty-six second graders, or a librarian at a small branch who wants a winter challenge, has two choices: a paper chart on the wall, or a platform somebody else has to buy. Paper works, and Peabody prints it, but a child can't watch a paper chart fill on the bus home.

So the maker gives you the part of those platforms that sets a challenge up, and leaves out the part that collects children.

What you pick

The name comes from lists on purpose. Anything a grown-up types would show up on every child's screen, and a list means no name, no nickname and no in-joke ever does.

What the children see

The link opens a page with the challenge's name, its dates and its finish line, read aloud with one tap. Each child picks an animal face (brothers and sisters each pick their own, up to six on one device) and taps to log a book: one of Peabody's free stories at their level from the library, a book from a kids' list or a series, or a book from anywhere, typed by a grown-up after a two-second hold. The picture fills a step a book. They can print their chart at any time, and the certificate prints at the finish line and not before.

What you print

Three sheets come with every challenge you make:

• The poster, with the name, the finish line, the dates and a big QR code to scan, for the classroom door or the library desk.
• The class wall chart with your challenge's name: thirty rows and a square a book, for the children who would rather colour a square than tap a screen.
• A sign-up sheet with a line for each reader and boxes for their age group, started and finished. The names go on paper and nowhere else.

If you want the count on the board, the class tally keeps it with numbers instead of names: a child shows you their own count on their tracker's "Show my teacher" screen and you add it.

What Peabody keeps

Nothing about you or your class. The link holds the rules: what counts, the finish lines, the dates, the picture and the two words of the name. Your own list of challenges is kept in your browser. Each child's books stay on their own device. Peabody counts that a book was logged in a made challenge, and not which challenge, which book, or which child.

Ideas to start with

• A January goal: eight, six and four books from 4 to 31 January, with the wall chart by the door.
• Twenty reading days in March: a days challenge across the month, twenty days to the finish, so a busy week doesn't end it.
• Bingo over a break: the bingo card from the last day of term to the first day back.
• A library summer: books by age from 1 June to 31 August, with the poster at the desk. Peabody's own summer challenge is ready too.
• A family challenge: no dates, a finish line each, and the chart on the fridge.

Questions teachers ask

Can I see who has finished?

Not on Peabody, by design: we never learn who is reading. Children show you their certificate or their "Show my teacher" screen, and you tick the sign-up sheet or add it to the class tally.

What if a child doesn't have a device at home?

The wall chart is the same challenge on paper. A child can colour squares at school and, if they get a device later, start the link and catch up their books in a few taps.

Can I change a challenge after I've shared it?

Changing anything makes a new link, because the link is the rules. Readers who started the old one keep their books on it. If you need to change a date, share the new link and tell the class which to use.