Teachers and children in Islington have been getting inventive to mark World Book Day during lockdown, as primary schools remain shut to most students across the borough.
Winton Primary School is using a space theme to celebrate, beginning with the story ‘Look Up!’ by Nathan Bryon. Assistant Head Teacher Sheree Cunningham said the school is celebrating the entire week because “we did not want [lockdown] to stop the children having the memorable and fun World Book Day that they usually have.”
From building space shuttle dens at home to writing about space over Zoom, the children have been having a fantastic week, Cunningham said.
“To add to the excitement,” she said, “each day has been full of stories shared by our wonderful staff. From bedtime stories, masked storytellers and even a video of the staff performing the story ‘The Day the Crayons Came Home’” by Mark Warner.
The school is looking forward to Friday, when the children and staff will be dressing up as their favourite book characters over Zoom. Each student will receive a book when they are welcomed back to school on Monday, as the school swapped its book tokens for the World Book Day £1 books.
Celebrations at St. John’s Highbury Vale CE Primary School are being postponed until next Thursday, following the full return to school on Monday. Interim Head of School Lindsey Hodgson said: “It will give them a lovely opportunity to come together and have some fun, after such a long time apart.”
The school will run virtual workshops, while staff are putting together a Masked Reader quiz, based on ITV’s The Masked Singer. “Each teacher will read a section of a book with a mask on and disguise their voices. The children then need to guess which teacher is reading which section,” said Hodgson.
Alongside celebrations on the day, St. Andrew’s CE Primary School is planning to mark the day again in Summer when the whole school can dress up as their favourite characters. Key Stage Two Leader Lucy Courtney-Diggins said this means “their costumes and efforts can be seen by everyone, making the experience more special”.
Having taken part in the live reading events on the World Book Day website since Wednesday, children will also be exploring a range of reading activities. Courtney-Diggins said they have planned “a lesson on reading for pleasure, what this means and our ‘journey’ of reading throughout our lives”.
Copenhagen Primary School is also postponing their dress up day until next Thursday. Headteacher Amardeep Panesar said this will “allow all children to participate because our children and community absolutely adore dressing up, so we will be having an online parade where parents can see too.”
Today, alongside quizzes and World Book Day activities, poet Paul Lyalls is working with the Year Fours in a session on their favourite book, including designing its front cover. Panesar said the dress-up day next week will be their “big glam event”, and students will participate in an online parade which parents can enjoy.
Continuing the celebrations, Prior Weston Primary School launched its World Book Day activities on Monday. Like St. John’s, The children have been enjoying guessing the Masked Reader: a masked member of staff who has joined virtual assemblies to read an extract of a story, while the children have to guess their identity. The Year Fours have also had a poetry session with Lyalls.
Assistant Head Aoife McMonagle said the school has four competitions for which students can submit entries via its online learning platform, including building a theme from their favourite book, creating a board game based on their favourite story and writing book reviews. “It encourages that kind of togetherness, although we are very much apart at the moment,” she said.
@Prior_Weston we love to read. Here’s a video of our staff sharing some of their favourite books. Can you see any of your favourites? #WorldBookDay #LoveReading ?? #ShareABook https://t.co/SGhGxdnklV
— Prior Weston Primary (@Prior_Weston) March 2, 2021
McMonagle said the school was keen to maintain their celebrations for World Book Day despite lockdown, which has allowed it to experiment with new ideas, such as the staff creating a video sharing their favourite books.
Today, students and staff alike will be dressing up for Zoom. “We’ve been chatting all week about what we are going to wear in our sessions with the kids,” McMonagle said, “thankfully there is quite a lot still going on.”
