We are delighted to announce the shortlist for the Dame Rose Tremain Short Story Competition. This year, we had twenty-one entries ranging from sci-fi and crime to philosophical musings and speculative fiction, and narrowing down a shortlist of eight was extremely challenging! Congratulations to the following girls for being shortlisted: Sara A (Y7); Theodora S, Angel U and Angel P (Y8); Hania S (Y9); Cecily B and Geogia L (Y10) and Nara M (Y11). This year’s judge is Anthony Hinton, Senior Commissioning Editor at David Fickling Books: the winner and runner up, receiving £500 and £100 respectively, will be announced at Prizegiving in June. Those who didn’t quite make it onto the shortlist this year are warmly invited to get feedback on their writing and their entries from Ms Shevah.
DEAR (Drop Everything and Read) has returned, this time with a different focus. Drawing on Ms Shevah’s First Chapters Reading Club idea of introducing students to different genres and types of books by reading just the opening each week, students in all year groups (bar exam years) have had their form teachers read them the opening chapters of books in form time over the last two weeks. More books are scheduled for the coming weeks: ask your daughters about the books and about being read to. Research has shown that reading aloud to your children is beneficial for teens, too.
Ms Shevah, Director of Literacy & Oracy
