To finish our World Book Day 2022 celebrations, here at BCS Pre-Prep invited James Bates from West End in Schools to come in to run literacy workshops. This brought some of our favourite children’s classic books to life exploring them through dance, songs, and dramatic activities.

EYFS – Jack and the Beanstalk 

Nursery and Reception were taken on a magical adventure, we jumped into the story book of the classic children’s tale ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ and appeared in the Giants Castle in the clouds. We worked in small groups and decided things that we would take from the castle and down the beanstalk. But wait… The Giant woke up! We had to work as a group and get down the beanstalk safely and chop it down to save the school from the evil giant.

The children had an amazing time taking part in the Workshop and loved being immersed within the story.

‘I liked it when the giant said fee fi fo fum’ – Reception boy

‘It was fun climbing up the beanstalk to take the hen that laid the golden egg.’ – Reception Girl

‘It was funny, being the Jack’s mum’ – Nursery Boy

Year 1 – Stickman 

The children in Year 1 and 2 were captivated by the drama workshops led by Jimmy from the West End Theatre company. In Year 1, the children were encouraged to act out parts of the story, ‘The Stick Man’ and reenacted the role of the main characters using movement, gestures and expressions.. The imaginative juices were definitely flowing and some promising acting skills were being developed.

One Year 1 boy remarked:   “ It was such fun acting out all the different parts. I particularly enjoyed pretending to be the dog from the story.”

“ I really enjoyed The Stick Man because it was like playing a fun game the whole time.”  Year 1 girl

Year 2 – Matilda

The children were transformed into the characters of Matilda, Miss Honey and Miss Trunchbull amongst others from the Roald Dahl book. They were dropped into the book through an imaginary portal and explored different scenarios from the story. The children were very good at posing as statues, especially when they had to change from the angry, despicable character of Miss Trunchbull to the kind, sweet character of Miss Honey. It was thrilling to see the children become so animated. The highlight was performing the Matilda choir where different sentences spoken by Miss Trunchbull were chanted in groups. A great cacophony of sound was heard all over Pre-Prep!

“ It was really exciting because I hadn’t acted out Matilda before. It was great fun!” Year 2 boy

“You got to do lots of acting , which was really interesting”  Year 2 girl

Mr D Robinson & Mrs H Straw