Boys’ School World Book Day
Boys’ School World Book Day
February 28, 2017 at 12:02 PM
In New Zealand, many of us take books for granted, we buy them in shops or borrow them from our local library but for many countries, this kind of accessibility isn’t possible.
Now in its 20th year, World Book Day is a celebration of authors, illustrators, books and most importantly, it’s a celebration of reading. In fact, it’s the biggest celebration of its kind, with over 100 countries participating all over the world.
As the Boys’ School students came together in the morning for assembly, you could see the variety of characters from books they are currently reading. Once again, Harry Potter was very prominent, Where’s Wally, Jesus from the Bible, Tintin, a number of superheroes and Gangsta Granny also made an appearance. Principal, Mr Peter Cassie turned up dressed as Gandalf, he lifted his wizard staff and hit the floor, the loud bang echoed through the hall quieting the students, which was then followed by laughter.
During assembly, Head of English, Mr Julian Procaccini said World Book Day is a day to encourage people to explore the pleasures of books and reading, which everyone would be doing in a few different ways during the day.
After assembly, the boys were split into their year groups to take on the day’s activities including meeting a range of people who work with books in one way or another. The boys rotated around three different workshops, including illustrations with Mr Michel Mulipola, writing with Mr Phillip W Simpson and theatre with Mr Michael Stretton and his tutors from Pform NZ.
Mr Michel Mulipola is a self-taught comic artist who lives in Auckland. His work includes the graphic novel series, Headlocked, which follow the trials and tribulations of an aspiring professional wrestler. Funnily enough, Mr Mulipola spends his weekends competing as a professional wrestler for Impact Pro Wrestling. Mr Mulipola showed the students some of his work before giving them a chance to try their hand at some illustrating.
Mr Michael Stretton and his tutors from Pform NZ NO COMMA helped bring literature to life NO COMMA through various drama activities. Pform NZ NO COMMA is a performance school that’s been providing arts, drama, musical theatre and dance classes Auckland wide to all ages since 1992. The boys tried their hand at acting out scenes from different books including ‘Where the wild things are’.
Mr Phillip W. Simpson is a teacher at an Auckland Primary School and a New Zealand author of many novels, chapter books and other stories for children. Before embarking on his writing career, he joined the army as an officer cadet, owned a comic shop and worked in recruitment. Mr Simpson discussed some ideas and techniques that the boys can use in their own writing, such as creating a problem, ‘every book must have a problem’ and using your senses to describe things, how they look, smell, feel, taste and sound like.
The students thoroughly enjoyed the day, comparing costumes and learning new skills. We cannot wait to see what next year’s World Book Day has in stall. The boys did really well but the books were the real winner on the day.
