Book Week began with a bang, with several of the ‘World’s Worst Teachers’ making an appearance in assembly, much to the delight of the children. Following this was a collaborative class competition creating a book jacket for each classroom door. Year 5 won with their atmospheric ‘Charlotte’s Web’. Monday also saw the launch of Verey Books’ pop-up book shop which ran throughout the week. The year 6 children were efficient and effective shopkeepers; operating the contactless machine was definitely the highlight!
During book week, the upper school children had reading buddy training, learning how to use rich questioning and pictures to help develop comprehension when reading with younger pupils. They then put their skills into practice with their own reading buddies. Staff were really impressed with their patience and interaction skills, as well as the enthusiasm they ignited in their young partners. The children then worked collaboratively in their cross age pairs to find 20 ‘Where’s Wallys’ around the school site and used the clues to uncover the secret book related message.
On our dress-up day, each class had chosen their own book theme. From David Walliams characters to fairy tales, there was all sorts of quirky sights across the school, with Hunter Hall families never failing to disappoint with their level of commitment!
Our school kitchen got in on the act and provided a ‘Hungry Caterpillar’ lunch on Wednesday, with the table-long caterpillar and absence of plates prompting great delight!
We enjoyed a morning of carousel activities, where children worked in mixed age groups on a series of book related inspiring workshops. An upper school highlight was making their own aircraft inspired by the picture book, ‘Paper Planes’. A lower school highlight was making Gruffalo masks.
There were 3 competitions running through book week. ‘Extreme Reading’ had children reading in weird and wonderful places. Highly commended were children reading on rollercoasters, on flying broomsticks and even on the Hunter Hall farmhouse roof! The winner was Ned in year 3 for his ‘archery target’ reading. The winner of the apple character competition was Henry Hughes for ‘Epos the Flamebird’, complete with jelly fire! Zach Lowther won the competition to make a picture book into a short film with his impressive stop motion animation of Peter Rabbit with homemade clay characters.