Telling tales encouraged at Wheatfield School - for one week only

​​Pupils at Wheatfield Primary School in Winnersh were encouraged to be both seen and heard recently when the school took part in National Story Telling Week.

William Shakespeare, Julia Donaldson, Roald Dahl and Michael Morpurgo were all on the agenda in a week of learning and activities based around the theme of literacy and the written word.

“Stories like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or The Gruffalo never go out of fashion, so having days of activities themed around them and other children’s classics was huge fun for the children, and also a very effective teaching technique,” said Wheatfield’s assistant deputy head Tamara Brown.

“They listened to favourites like We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, and then got to role play them, and also to tell the stories back to one another,” she explained. “Although a lot of the activities were associated with reading, the verbal side was really important too – we wanted them to get into the habit of telling and sharing stories, as well as listening to them, so for once as far as teachers were concerned, the more talking the better!”.

Wheatfield, which opened in September 2014, is a one-form entry primary school, and like its local partner school Windmill, is a member of the GLF group, a rapidly-expanding Surrey-based multi-academy trust which runs over a dozen schools in Surrey, Middlesex, Berkshire and Oxfordshire, based on an approach of collaborative learning.

“From acting to reading aloud to inspiring art projects, we built a whole week of activities around National Story Telling Week,” said Mrs Brown.  “Sending the children home talking about the books they’ve been reading at school encourages them to continue to explore their love of words at home. That makes for longer-lasting learning, and that can only be a good thing for everyone involved”.