Wednesday March 19th 2025

Dear Diary,

Today’s school visit was to Cirencester Primary. The pupils were a super bunch during my assembly, but with lots to pack into one day, we were straight onto the first workshop in no time – for Year 6. With shorter sessions than normal (in order to fit every year group in), the forty-five-minute session flew by. But I was really impressed with how much work the pupils managed to produce, and I especially loved Orlando’s story about a superhero with an embarrassing superpower… and his nemesis. It was brilliantly written and really comical, but I sadly didn’t manage to get a copy of it. I did however manage to get a photo of Edie’s super story:

Hey, you!! Guess what? I have a pet dinosaur! See, you might think I’m lying, but I’m really not! You might be wondering how, so I’ll tell you.

So, it was just a normal day when my mum told me we needed to go shopping. As normal, she forgot eggs. Silly Mum!! She always does that. So, we picked up the eggs, paid, and went home.

The next day, we wanted to have some scrambled eggs. We opened the box, and one thing particularly stuck out…

I also really enjoyed the following rap that was performed aloud (though the name of the author escapes me):

One day, a dinosaur turned up at my door.
He said he wanted to come in, with a roar.
I said, ‘Who are you here to see?’
He replied with a roar, ‘I’m here for your little brother Blakely!’
‘Okay, I’ll get him for you,’ I said.
‘I’ve just got to wake him up, he’s currently in bed.’
As I was going upstairs, the dino roared.
He sounded like a dinosaur lord.

The next session, for Years 3 & 4, seemed to be over even more quickly than the first. I think Kaleb, Toby, Harry, Lucas, Kayler, Faria, Zoey, Indi, and Aamina were all awarded certificates during this workshop. But I can’t for the life of me remember who came up with what! (Sorry, everyone, that’s old age addling my tired brain!!!) The Reception pupils who were up next were all great artists, and they came up with some hilarious pictures of Uncle John. They were so speedy and neat when it came to tracing the sentences about him, too. And during Year 5’s session after lunch, there were more fantastic pieces of work produced. I thought the start to Jacob, Dixie, Rupert, and Martha’s story was great fun:

One normal Sunday afternoon, a vampire named Vincent Long-Fang was casually eating an eighty-two-year-old woman in his basement. Suddenly, Vincent crunched on something that wasn’t supposed to crunch. Vincent was so freaked out that he ran out of his house to the nearest park…

And during the final workshop of the day, for Years 1 & 2, it was Harper who really impressed me with his story about an adorable monster. He then proceeded to draw a wonderful book cover for his story AND began writing the blurb, the opening sentence, and a further excerpt – all in under forty-five minutes! Throughout the whole day, the pupils were a joy to spend time with. They were all hardworking, polite, and engaged. I had great fun helping them all tap into their imaginations, and I hope many of them will continue to work on the masterpieces that they didn’t get to finish whilst I was with them.