The Marches School hosted a number of activities last week to celebrate national World Book Day. Staff and students welcomed visits from award winning authors, engaged in book related games, entered competitions and dressed up as their favourite book characters.

The celebrations began with the first Book Topple round taking place on Tuesday for the annual house competition. Author Holly Smale visited on Wednesday to talk about her award-winning book, Geek Girl, with Years 7, 8 and 9 girls from both The Marches School and Sir John Talbot’s School. They were also given the opportunity to purchase personalised and signed copies of the book.

On World Book Day itself over 300 primary students from Woodside, Holy Trinity, Bryn Offa and The Meadows Primary Schools came in to The Marches School to listen to Authors Andy Griffiths, Sibeal Pounder and Stephanie Burgis. Year 7 pupils also listened to Sibeal in the afternoon and learnt about the importance of character naming along with other important creative writing tips.

On Friday, students and staff dressed up as their favourite book characters with Harry Potter and The Hunger Games characters proving popular! At lunchtime students took part in a Bookamon Go treasure hunt.

It was the local bookshop, Booka Bookshop, who organised the authors to visit The Marches School as part of their Authors in Schools programme. They also set up a pop-up bookshop in the Learning Resource Centre (LRC) for the duration of the week to enable students to purchase some of the latest book releases.

Mrs Joanne Towers, LRC Coordinator at The Marches School, commented, “This has been our biggest and best World Book Day to date and I’m always encouraged by the enthusiasm of staff and students.”

Pictured – Year 7 students back L-R: Louise Delliston-Watson, Isabelle Woodcock, Chloe Ellis, Poppy Denton and Ellanor Nurse