This month, schools in the UK have been involved in World Book Day, from distributing £1 vouchers, to major whole school festivities. This has become a fundamental event in our school calendar with various activities including staff and students dressing up as their favourite literary characters. The aim is to encourage students to talk about books and reading, to celebrate and promote reading for pleasure.

Senior School 

At Senior School, we took part in a ‘drop everything and read’ cross curricular event throughout the week to encourage reading. Students in Year 7 held a book swap session where they exchanged good reads with other students.  There were numerous activities held in the library including: ‘Guess the book’, word searches and crosswords.

On World Book Day, Thursday 2^nd March, all students received their £1 book token. This was the twentieth anniversary of the special event where students receive a token donated by National Book Tokens. Students are able to take their token to their local bookshop to buy either a special £1 book produced for the occasion, or use it to receive £1 off a full price book. We held our special assembly where everyone paraded in their literary character costumes. Winners included characters from The Hunger Games, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sherlock Holmes and Harry Potter.

Our final event of the week was a book quiz held in the library on Friday. Seven teams of students battled through 6 rounds of questions to be crowned winners of the competition. The competition was fierce and the Marker’s decision was final! This year was won by team ‘Team Draco’ (Imogen and Ella in 9H).

Mrs Glazebrook
Librarian

Junior School 

Book Week at the Junior School was another huge success with activities to promote children’s love of reading occurring all the way from Nursery to Year 6. The week began with a special workshop for the Nursery and Reception girls with Rachel Mortimer, an author with particular expertise in the early years, retelling some of her books.

Girls in Year 1-6 brought books to life through exciting dance workshops with a real West End performer. The Year 1-3 day was themed 'Where the wild things are' and girls in Years 4, 5 and 6 looked at Roald Dahl’s ‘The BFG’ - it was absolutely fabulous! They represented each section of the story with a dance or a dramatic pose and put it all together as a show at the end of the session.

Thank you to everyone who brought in books for the ‘Book Swap’ – the hall was buzzing with excitement as everyone began swapping their tokens for a new book to read. Every child also received a £1 book token which can be used at most high street book stores. 

This year also saw the introduction of the classroom door decorating competition, ‘A Window into a Book’. Be sure to have a look at the classroom doors as you walk around the school. Can you guess what the book titles might be?

The finale to Book Week was celebrated by dressing as our favourite book character. The school was bustling with characters from traditional tales such as ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, to more modern novels such as ‘A Fault in our Stars’. The teachers did not disappoint with their costumes either, with Angelina Ballerina bringing much hilarity to our assembly.

What an inspirational week!