PIONEERING pupils at King’s Oak Primary School have helped their school turn a new page by setting up a library for their peers to enjoy.
Children’s author Lynsey Littleston officially opened ‘Imagination Island’ last week, which has been designed by school pupils as part of their ‘young leaders of learning’ project,
The youngsters have been setting up the library for more than a year and have worked with the rest of the school, as well as their peers from All Saints Primary, to make sure the project is a success.
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Teacher Liz Crerar, who has helped the children organise the project, told the Telegraph they had done an excellent job.
She said: “Our young leaders of learning who have had a project in the school to try and improve our attainment and reading, especially in terms of reading for enjoyment.
“The children asked if they could create a school library.
“We had to decide where to put it and they decided the best place was in our ICT suite.
“With the young leaders of learning project what we do is have two schools who are joined together, and they evaluate each other’s projects.
“We’ve really excited to have it open now, but our plans don’t stop there.
“This is part of our project to promote reading for enjoyment throughout the school and raise our reading attainment.
“We’re going to have different competitions, we’re going to do things for world book day, we’re going to maybe have a reading lunch time club and we’re then going to take it into classes.
“Eventually we want to become a reading school.”
After settling on the school’s ICT suite as the location for the library, the pupils mocked up a 3D plan of the room, which they then took to their peers in All Saints Primary to get their thoughts on the plans.
They then asked their schoolmate to vote on what books they would like to see in the library, with favourites like Horrid Henry, Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Harry Potter coming out on top.
When the books arrived, the young leaders divided the books up by age and category and put a King’s Oak stamp on each novel. They also held a poll to decide on the library’s name.
There were smiles on the faces of all of the young leaders as Mrs Littleston cut the ribbon to open their new library and they and their classmates got to enjoy a slice of cake to celebrate.
Daniel Telfer, 9, who is one of the young leaders, said: “I’m very excited about the library and I’m super happy because we’ve been working on this for a long time.
“It’s taken us over a year to get it done and I’m just really happy we can finally get everybody in to get books and try them out.”
Sophia McLellan, 11, who has also worked on the project, added: “We’ve been working so hard, and we used a whole day to get it all sorted out.
“I’m so glad it’s open now.”
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