St Mary’s Catholic Primary School held its annual Book Week and Science Week celebrations during August, with Dress Up as a Book Character Day, a visit by the Australian author Tristian Bancks and ‘The Big Write’.
St Mary’s Assistant Principal, Diane McClure, said the theme for Book Week 2023 was Read, Grow, Inspire, and the theme for Science Week was Innovation: Powering Future Industries.
As a part of The Big Write, students from all grades were asked to write a short story in response to a stimulus image which was placed in the library.
This stimulus featured a painting of a school and three silver robot figurines made of cardboard.
Each class was introduced to the stimulus by the school librarian, Mrs Catherine O’Brien.
They collaborated to generate a vocabulary list to assist the students writing their story; the students then returned to class to commence writing.
After all stories were completed, the top five pieces of writing were shortlisted and submitted to student judges from McAuley College, as well as McAuley College Principal Mrs Deidre Young, Councillor Michael Enright and Beaudesert Bulletin Editor, Keer Moriarty.
A common theme amongst the entries was friendship, which was represented by the three robots that were featured in every story.
Winners and second place getters were announced the following week during assembly, where one writer was chosen from each year level as the ‘Best Writer 2023’ and received a medal for their efforts.
The Big Write was an inaugural effort by St Mary’s to incorporate Science Week into Book Week and encourage students to develop and improve their writing skills.
Through the efforts of all the teachers and the assistance of Tristian Bancks, all students successfully participated in the competition and created entertaining stories.
