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World Book day 2025

We began the day with a special World Book Day assembly. We were joined by Alice in Wonderland, The Queen Of Hearts and some Playing Card Guards as well as many other famous characters from literature! Unfortunately, white roses had been grown in the Queen of Hearts' garden instead of red roses and chaos ensued!

We thought about the types of books we liked to read and when and where we liked reading. We listened to some authors telling us their likes and dislikes regarding reading, we shared our fabulous costumes with one another and then prepared for an amazing day!

The rest of World Book Day 2025 was spent in classes where EYFS and Key Stage 1 children were immersed in the book, 'The Last Wolf' by Mini Grey. Children enjoyed finding out about the twist in the text and comparing the Last Wolf with the traditional version of Little Red Riding Hood. Pupils were involved in drama and discussion activities based on the book, produced paintings of forests where the Last Wolf lived and a number of 3-D forests, created to link with the theme of the story.

In Key Stage 2,the text 'Flotsam' by David Wiesner was studied. The book is made up with only illustrations which was quite unusual for some children. Inference skills were used to 'read' the wonderful illustrations and pupils enjoyed making their very own illustration-only books, participating in drama and role play activities and discussing the text, even predicting what might happen after the story had finished.  

For the last part of the afternoon, we met up with our 'Reading Buddies'. We enjoyed reading and sharing our favourite texts, from home, and discussing them with our reading buddies.

We love Reading Buddies in Years 1-6. Pupils and staff are loving this experience and we look forward to this time every week.

What is ‘Reading Buddies’?

Reading Buddies is where two individuals read together. By linking Year 3 with Year 6, Year 2 with Year 5 and Year 1 with Year 4, we have ensured that an older child reads regularly with a younger child (and the younger child reads with the older child).

Why are we doing this?

By pairing up children from different classes, we are developing relationships between children of different age groups. We are also giving all pupils the opportunity to practise reading on a regular basis and with this practice, pupils can improve their skills. For both the older pupils and the younger pupils, they have the chance to develop fluency as well as a sense of pride in helping each other. Expression and intonation are also improved. We encourage both children in the pair to read and then discuss their book. They can then ask and answer questions during the session. Listening skills are also a big part of the session along with social skills. In the long-term, it is hoped that these regular reading sessions will develop a love of reading and nurture a mutual interest in reading as well.