27 Jun Carnegie Shadowing Book Group at Waterstones book store

We had the huge pleasure of taking a group of our year 7 and 8 students to Waterstones book store last week to give presentations on four of the  books that had been nominated for this year’s prestigious Carnegie Award.  Our students had met with a group of students from The Spires College to put together their presentations.  After reading the books they considered the themes and characters within the books and how the books had challenged their thinking.  The books were:

The House with Chicken Legs by Sophie Anderson

Things a Bright Girl can do by Sally Nicholls

Rebound by Kwame Alexander

Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds

After giving their presentations the students were asked questions by the adult book group members from Waterstones.  Their answers were thoughtful and insightful!  Things a Bright Girl can do provoked a lot of discussion on equality.  Among the debates students were challenged to consider whether they judge a book by its cover and whether boys would read a book a book with a female protagonist (they would!).  Tasters of Russian food to support the House with Chicken Legs presentation were made by Mrs Taylor and her elite subject academy food technology students.  All the adults commented on what a wonderful occasion it was and how wonderful it was to see students from different school working collaboratively on a project.