Last week I visited Djanogly City Academy on Thursday and Friday morning. I have been to Djanogly a few times now. It is a huge state-of-the art school in Nottingham. Despite specializing in IT the first thing you see as you walk through the imposing glass doors is the library. There it is, straight ahead, open plan and exposed for all to see, telling you that books are at the heart of this school.
Another way they show this is by deploying their retired librarian; the one, the only, the brilliant Helen Pallett, to all their feeder schools to support Y5 classes in their reading development. Lucky kids having such an expert on hand! And the icing on the cake? Only a trip to BIG SCHOOL to meet a real live author (little old me) and to be given a goodie bag at the end that included one of my books. Generous or what? I’m sure those two days have helped keep There’s Only One Danny Ogle in print… and I’m not even kidding. Better still, all that input from their own teachers and Helen, pays off. I stupidly challenged the Y5s to ask me a question about my writing that I’d never been asked before. ‘I’ll give a signed copy of one of my books,’ I told them, ‘but I have been doing visits for ten years so I’m pretty confident I’ll be keeping it.’ Three questions in and three books down I surrendered. I won’t be doing that one again; those kids were bright!
The Friday session coincided with Comic Relief Day so the pupils and staff trooped in ‘wearing something funny for money.’ I wasn’t sure about the ‘funny’ part. It can be quite disturbing performing in front of dozens of fairies and clowns! Once again though, the kids were great. i was especially impressed with the group who volunteered to demonstrate the Maori ‘haka’ (don’t ask) in front of everyone.
Below are some of the pupils having their books signed. Schools involved over the two days included Carrington, Claremont, Berridge, Forest Fields, Bentinck, Scotholme and Northgate.
