Guest Blog Written by Rachel Glibbery @ St Bede’s Inter-Church School Cambridge
On a hot and sticky Tuesday in June, in the middle of a heatwave, 57 students from St. Bede’s, travelled by coach into London to attend the Carnegie Awards Ceremony. The venue was the Cambridge Theatre in Covent Garden, home to the fantastic Royal Shakespeare Company’s, Matilda the Musical. Three staff and I organised the students onto the coach, laden with plenty of water bottles and packed lunches, along with a hefty dose of excitement and anticipation for the event. The journey was longer than expected but the students entertained themselves by singing along to the radio and chatting about which books they thought would win. We arrived at the theatre with moments to spare before the ceremony began. The atmosphere sparked with energy and enthusiasm as the audience waited to hear which books would be the Carnegie Medal winners.
Our shadowing group had been reading all the shortlisted books for the Carnegie medal for writing, over 3 months. Every Friday morning, we would get together for half an hour to discuss the books we had read that week. I ran the group together with the head of English and another English teacher, which was great to share the responsibility. We always have a large group of around 50 students between years 8 & 10, with only a few who don’t read the young adult titles. Every year, we invite Louise Aldridge from Cambridgeshire Libraries, to discuss the shortlisted books with our shadowing group. Louise, a former Carnegie judge, always leads a fantastic morning, engaging our students in lively discussion and listening to their diverse views and opinions.
‘Wolf Siren’ had been popular with many of our students, many of them voting for it as their favourite book, so when it was announced as the Shadowers’ Choice winner and the Medal for writing winner, the cheer from the theatre was incredible. It was such a momentous occasion, witnessing the awards live. The hosts, authors and illustrators were engaging and inspiring, championing libraries, librarians, reading and creativity. The students enjoyed hearing from the authors we had followed on our shadowing journey, and what it would mean to them if they won the Shadowers’ Choice Award.
On the day of the event, I gave feedback forms to our group asking them to rank the books from 1 – 8 (1 being top choice) and list 3 words to describe each title. I also asked them to reflect on their experience of being part of the Carnegie Shadowing group and attending the awards ceremony, and any suggestions for next year’s Carnegie Shadowing. I had some interesting thoughts and ideas; someone wrote, ‘Go to London again!’ and they collectively described the event as: ‘immersive’, ‘exciting’, ‘memorable’, ‘exhilarating’, ‘engaging’ and ‘fun’ and ‘a new experience that we will always remember’. They ‘liked the anticipation of waiting for the results’ and ‘hearing from the authors and illustrators in person’ and ‘it felt even more exciting to actually be there’.
Interestingly, our shadowing group was very much divided on the books. Though Wolf Siren was popular, many said they felt that another book should have won one of the awards. For example, Tia Fisher’s ‘Not Going to Plan’ was a big hit with our group, and many of them had voted for that one. A comment from one student was; ‘Next year we would like to see more books with older, more serious topics like Not Going to Plan, because it makes the books more meaningful and I think in Carnegie shadowing it would allow kids around our age to be exposed to new topics.’
The idea of dressing up as a character from one of the books and devoting more time to the shadowing group meetings was put forward, along with changing the days as a lot of students had other commitments which meant they weren’t able to attend all the time and so missed out on the group discussions.
The Carnegie Awards ceremony seemed to be over in a flash, and we were back out in the heat where we took the opportunity for a group photo. Understandably the theatre needed everyone out so they could prepare for that evening’s performance of Matilda. Due to heavy traffic our late arrival meant our group hadn’t all had a chance to use the toilets, so our head of English took some students across to the Cafe Nero toilets, where they bumped into Bruce Bogtrotter, from the cast of Matilda, which made us all giggle! Our group had also missed the opportunity to meet some of the shortlisted authors who were circulating the theatre prior to the event, signing books. However, some students did manage to purchase books in the foyer afterwards and one student met the president of CILIP, Carryl Allardice who was happy to sign a book! The return journey was even longer, and the air conditioning wasn’t working very well, but despite the overwhelming heat and everyone being sat for an incredibly long time, there was no complaining. The students were brilliant and entertained themselves with books, card games and singing along to their favourite tunes. I will be applying again next year to attend the awards ceremony and if we are lucky enough, I’ll make sure we leave school much earlier so we can make the most of the short event. The whole experience has embedded just how important these book groups are to young readers. It gives them a sense of connection with their peers. They can step into another person’s shoes and see the world from a new perspective, exposing them to new ideas and topics.
