Posted on: March 22nd 2019
What a fun couple of weeks we’ve had celebrating World Book Day! Thankfully there was no snow this year to hamper our dressing up and the teachers were very impressed with the amount of imagination and effort that went into preparations for the day. Everyone looked fabulous and there were parades and assemblies in every department to celebrate.
There was also a bumper buddy swap over with Form 6 visiting Form 2 and Form 1 popping in to see Form 5. Form 4 headed over to Reception and the Senior Prep Book Club had a lovely session reading stories and playing with the children in the Infant Community. Our sessions with the younger children are always such fun and it is incredibly heartwarming to see how caring and supportive the older children are when interacting with their buddies. It is also wonderful to see the confidence of the youngest children when they speak to children many years older than them and the genuine friendships that are blossoming between them.
Reception and Form 1 were very lucky to have an illustrator workshop in the morning and they all enjoyed hearing Nicola Kinnear’s story ‘A Little Bit Brave’ and they learned how to draw the main character. It was actually Nicola’s first visit into a school and to quote Sanchita from The Children’s Bookshop in Muswell Hill who helped set up the visit, “She couldn’t have picked a nicer school to start her journey in.” A huge thank you to the teachers and children for making Nicola and her publisher so welcome and thank you for the incredible support from the parents who purchased 36 signed copies of her book.
Alongside all of the mentioned merriment, Eva and Holly taught poetry to Form 5 and there were book quizzes, story sessions and a whole host of fun drama activities. Speaking of drama, we were also very lucky to have Hannah from West End in Schools join us on Thursday last week, to run some amazing Roald Dahl themed workshops for Forms 2 to 6. She had the children mesmerised from the moment they walked in and her enthusiasm and knowledge of the stories really made the sessions special. Another huge thank you to the Friends of Norfolk House for financing the workshops once again. It was a fitting end to two whole weeks of book related fun.
Sponsorship money for either the Ready, Steady Read or Listen challenges should be sent into class teachers by Monday 25th March, please. Once the funds have been collected, teachers will be asking their classes to choose some lovely new Usborne books for their class libraries. The mini pop up Usborne book fairs on Tuesday and Thursday this week were also very successful and hopefully, we will be receiving lots of books for free on top of the titles our pupils have bought.
Both teachers and pupils really appreciate the support parents have given over the past few weeks, to help foster a love of reading for all. We are also thrilled to have made some valuable links with our local bookshop and a children’s book provider that could enable us to put on inspiring reading events on a regular basis.
