Issue No. 13 Easter 2025
READING NEWSLETTER
Welcome to our Easter edition of the St Cuthbert’s Reading Newsletter. We hosted our very first St Cuthbert’s Reading Festival this half term and so we have lots to update you with!
St Cuthbert’s Reading festival
World Book Day? That is so last year. This year, St Cuthbert’s held their first Reading Festival which turned World Book Day into World Book Week. Bustling and energetic, the Reading Festival generated a lot of buzz from the boys who moved between author visits, book bistros, escape rooms, and treasure hunts. Beginning the week with our “opening act”, author Ross Welford gave a magical talk to pupils in Year 7 and Year 8, exploring the Science Fiction Genre. Our “closing act” featured author, H.F. Askwith, who ran a creative writing workshop with pupils from Year 9, which focused on creative writing and the publishing process.
Reading festival!
During the week, a curse befell the library, as it became the setting of our literary escape room, locking pupils and students inside if they failed to find the clues and riddles. A year group team was assembled from Years 7, 8, 9, 10, and 12, and their aim was to escape in the quickest time.
They put their book and library knowledge to the test and Year 10 were our champions, who escaped with a time of 17 minutes and 58 seconds. Also, at lunch time across the week, departments volunteered their time to host a ‘Book Bistro’. A reading cafe that pupils and students could pop to, the boys eagerly engaged to learn about books linked to different subject areas and enjoy some tasty snacks in the process! Mr Knowles, Head of Maths, held a very informative book bistro that engaged boys in books linked to Maths. Miss Charlton, Geography, planned a bistro around the text ‘Around the World in 80 Days’, while English turned Upper Volta into ‘Voltarium’, a fictional setting to explore the Fantasy genre. Mrs Carter in Computer Science hosted a very cozy book bistro, and Miss Peacock, in RE, had a wide range of games to explore ethics books. Miss Seymour, in History, had a lot of historical-fiction books borrowed in the History Book Bistro too! A great success all round.