Bolton School’s Primary Division was filled with colourful celebrations of reading for World Book Day as pupils in the Infant, Junior Boys’ and Junior Girls’ Schools dressed up as favourite characters. Even the Pre-School Class got involved with dressing up. In all three schools, the day was filled with activities themed around books, reading and storytelling.
At the Infant School, Beech House, children were encouraged to bring in the book that inspired their costume to share with the rest of their class, and the day was filled with lessons based on books and stories. From creating their own Willy Wonka-style chocolate bars to making Enormous Crocodile hand-puppets to learning more about how stories work and created their own timelines based on fairy tales, there were so many fun activities throughout the day.
Around World Book Day, the Infants also enjoyed visits from two children’s authors: Christina Gabbitas and Steve Weatherill!
The Junior Boys started the day with a whole-school assembly, followed by a morning of story creation: an illustration workshop with Corinna Campbell hosted on YouTube allowed them to create their own characters, and they went on to make a short story and comic strip using this character as the inspiration. At lunchtime, boys teamed up for the World Book Day Scavenger Hunt, which this year was themed around villains! There was lots of excitement as boys followed the clues to find seven villains, and interrogated their teachers to complete the additional challenge of finding out who they were dressed as for the occasion. The afternoon began with a live, virtual talk from Michael Rosen, which was undoubtedly a highlight of the day. Finally, the teachers swapped classes to share their favourite childhood tales and recent reads with another group of boys.
Meanwhile the Junior Girls also had a day packed with exciting World Book Day activities. The morning started with a World Book Day assembly and in lessons the girls enjoyed a range of reading-related activities. In their Modern Foreign Language lessons, they read story books in French and Spanish and the girls also learned how to describe their favourite types of books. A science lesson saw girls using physics to create miniature catapults to save Aslan from the Chronicles of Narnia, while in English they wrote Roald Dahl-style revolting recipes and shared book extracts. They even came up with ‘Wonka’ weather forecasts!
Throughout World Book Day, there was a focus on sharing favourite stories and encouraging children to enjoy reading.
Children at the Nursery and pupils in the Boys’ and Girls’ Divisions also celebrated the day in a variety of ways.
