International Literacy Day on Thursday 8th September was celebrated by all boys in Year 3 to 6. In assembly time boys were challenged to think about the importance of reading and writing. Billy Paisley in Y6SA showed the novel that he had written over the holiday as well as all the book reviews he had written and enjoyed. Boys were delighted to hear that Tom Palmer has agreed to be our Patron of reading for the school year and are excited already about meeting him in October when he visits. Many of the boys remembered meeting Tom at the Gosforth Community Book Festival. Boys agreed that Tom is a great fit for NSB with his shared love of reading, writing, storytelling, football and rugby.
In Year 6 boys spent time researching about Tom and all of them came away with a book in mind of Tom’s that they may now want to read themselves. Many of the boys in Year 6 love war stories and it was great to discover that Tom has written several. Boys were also introduced to the work of Shaun Tan and enjoyed a film adaptation of his worldwide best seller The Lost Thing and then had great fun designing their own Lost Things full of wonderful detail and some fantastic clashes between the natural and synthetic world which is a fascination of Shaun Tan’s himself.
Year 5 discussed the impact literacy has had on the world, the history of story-telling and the different formats that are available now. They looked at authors websites and the Museum of Books website which collates stories from around the world. Mrs Penfold read one of her favourite short stories from Ancient China followed by a discussion with the class. In Mrs Elliot’s English set, boys spent time think about what literacy means and what it means to be literate. Each boy created a poster for a word that is new to them after they concluded that having an extensive vocabulary is very important!
In Year 4, the boys investigated Tom Palmer’s website and were amazed to discover that he had written so many books! They all agreed that pairing a love of sport and reading was a fantastic idea, and that Tom was on to a real winner here. Some of the boys fondly remembered Tom’s talk at the Gosforth Community Book Festival, and were looking forward greatly to his return visit this year. They then attempted Tom’s quiz about his books from his website, and were really excited to hear that he had also written the Wings series, with some football-loving boys being transported in time to fly some RAF World War planes. The boys are really looking forward to reading more of Tom’s books and can’t wait to pose their questions to him on his visit.