Exeter School welcomes authors for World Book Day

Exeter School is welcoming three authors to school for World Book Day.

To celebrate the theme of Imaginary Worlds, pupils in Exeter Junior School will be carrying out story telling workshops with Katy Cawkwell on Thursday 4 March.

Storyteller Katy creates performances for adult, family and school audiences, based on traditional source material and has worked regularly in a wide range of schools, museums and other organisations, including Royal Opera House, English National Opera, The Barbican, The British Museum, The Museum of London and The National Gallery.

English teacher Leah Hardy said: “Katy will be using a range of imaginative stimuli, to encourage Exeter Junior School pupils to immerse themselves in creative writing; based on their illustrations of an imaginary world. We look forward to entering into a magical world of wonder and mystery and letting our imaginations soar.”

In the evening, Junior School pupils will return to school for bedtime stories and cocoa where they will listen to Katy and former pupil Charlie Alder tell the Russian folktale Vasilissa and Baba Yoga or the Norse myth of Otter’s Ransom.

Author and illustrator Charlie completed her Drama A-Level studies at Exeter School and her first book, Daredevil Duck, was published in 2015. She said she was delighted to return to her former school for World Book Day.

During the day, Senior School pupils will enjoy a talk from former tabloid journalist turned novelist Julie Hearn.

While completing a Master’s Degree in Women’s Studies at Oxford University, an idea for Julie’s thesis became the inspiration for her first novel, Follow Me Down. Since then the Carnegie Medal Award nominee has written about witchcraft, madness and the slave trade.

Librarian Liz Taylor said pupils would enjoy the opportunity to meet this popular author and have copies of her books autographed.

On Friday after World Book Day, Charlie Alder will lead a session on the ‘day in the life of an author’ for Junior School pupils in Year 3. She will then help them illustrate a character they created in their storytelling session taken from their Imaginary World beyond the wardrobe.