Old Worlds, New Worlds and Other Worlds
This year’s Book Week theme was Old Worlds, New Worlds and Other Worlds, and at Santa Maria College, we were out of this world with activities focussing on our girls love for reading.
We started celebrating a week early with our visiting author, Michael Speechly, speaking to Years 5 and 6 about his picture book The All New Must Have Orange 430. It was an engaging and very funny event!
A new webpage on the library management system portal was created to house all the library events. Each day students had the opportunity to guess the book described through a Book Bento Box. They were tricky, but congratulations to all those girls who put their knowledge of great texts to use.
Students used their problem-solving skills and creativity in our book-themed Digital Escape Rooms on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday at lunchtime. We hit the week off with a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, where the girls aptly won some chocolate by finding their way through the factory. Thursday saw them concur Wonderland, and Friday, they explored and escaped the world of Fairytales.
On Wednesday, students participated in a Silent (Reading) Disco. Armed with a great book, students enjoyed reading and dancing – at the same time! Thanks for all the great moves, girls.
It was so lovely to see our beautiful library so vibrate with creative, gritty and feisty book characters on Thursday when the junior book club (Little Pages) dressed up for the occasion. Little Pages spent recess discussing their characters and competing in a book scavenger hunt across the library. We also managed to squeeze a few #BookFaces into the morning, which is a fun way of promoting the books in our library.
Book Week reminds us that regularly getting lost in literary worlds is a highly beneficial practice in both childhood and adulthood. Literacy skills, empathy skills, cognitive strength and even our health are improved just by enjoying a good book.
Kimberly Kay in Class 5.3 said “I loved the escape room activity we had as it had difficult questions to answer. I really put my mindset to it and it made me feel entertained.”
Emily Grieves in Class 5.3 dressed up as Moon Face from The Faraway Tree. Emily said, “I really liked the book scavenger hunt that Mrs Hollingsworth gave us and I liked that we could dress up.”
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- Featured, Learning4Life
Author: Santa Maria College
Santa Maria College is a vibrant girls school with a growing local presence and reputation. Our Mission is to educate young Mercy women who act with courage and compassion to enrich our world. Santa Maria College is located in Attadale in Western Australia, 16 km from the Perth CBD. We offer a Catholic education for girls in Years 5 – 12 and have 1300 students, including 152 boarders.
