Staff and students at Neston Primary School are celebrating after winning a top literacy award.
The school, on Burton Road, Little Neston, has carried off the first ever whole-school John Downing Award.
The award is one of two made by the UK Literary Association (UKLA) to recognise and celebrate creative teaching inspired by quality texts.
Since 2005 the association has made the John Downing Award, named after its first president, to an individual teacher who has inspired their class to immerse themselves in a chosen text.
In 2017 a new ‘whole school’ category was introduced which encouraged Neston Primary to involve the entire school in their project.
Staff and a group of children selected the book Atlas of Adventures by Lucy Letherland and Rachel Williams from the UKLA Book Award shortlist for the previous year.
The beautifully illustrated picture and information book inspired Neston Primary children of all ages to explore history, science, geography, music, dance, art, design and drama in a project carried out over two months earlier this year.
To present their ‘imaginative and stimulating’ entry, the school used a variety of media which led UKLA judging panel chairman Joy Court to say: “Their beautifully prepared scrapbook made inventive use of QR codes to link to video and musical demonstrations of the high quality work they produced as well as presenting examples of creative writing and artwork throughout the school.”
Speaking after hearing of the school’s success Neston Primary head Rob Golding said: “We are delighted to have won this award. This justifiably recognises the energy, creativity and hard work of our pupils and staff.”
He says staff were as enthusiastic about the project as the children themselves with teacher, Margie Robinson suggesting: “This was an amazing opportunity for all pupils, aged from 4 to 11, to work together on a combined project and to use such a beautiful book as the inspiration for work right across the curriculum.”
Mr Golding will attend UKLA’s 53rd annual international conference in Glasgow on July 1 to deliver a presentation describing the work carried out and the children’s response.
He will also be presented with the school’s award by the authors of Atlas of Adventures.
As an additional reward UKLA will endeavour to arrange a visit to the school by the authors to enable them to meet Neston Primary’s pupils who were so enthusiastic about their book.
Neston Primary’s most recent OFSTED finding was ‘Good’ with ‘Outstanding’ features.
