Book Week 2023

Each year students and staff look forward to celebrating Children's Book Council of Australia Book week . This year’s theme was ‘READ GROW INSPIRE'.Reading books inspires boys by transporting them to new worlds, introducing them to diverse perspectives, and sparking their imagination. Through the captivating narratives and characters, books offer a gateway to explore different cultures, time periods, and experiences, fostering empathy and understanding.

The knowledge and insights gained from books can motivate individuals to pursue their passions, cultivate creativity, and aspire to new heights, making reading a powerful source of inspiration. Along with the fabulous guest authors, writing intensives and library events, another highlight was the Book Week parade on Friday, where students and staff dressed up as their favourite book character.

Write a Book in a Day

As part of ATC’s Book Week, a group of Years 6-9 students spent the day in Westcourt Library in an enrichment activity that required them to plan, write and illustrate a whole book in just one day! The ‘Write a Book in a Day’ competition is managed by The Kids’ Cancer Project and is a fun way to help a valuable cause. Each team is provided a unique set of parameters to write their story: two human characters, one non-human character, an issue, a setting and five random words. Digital editions of the completed stories are donated to children in hospitals across Australia, and we also publish the boys’ books and add them to our library collection at ATC so other students can borrow and enjoy them! It was a big day with creative ideas were shared and new friendships were forged. Well done to our talented writing teams, we look forward to borrowing and reading your wonderful books!

Guest Authors

Book Week special guests included the much-loved author R.A. Spratt who entertained Junior School students by reading chapters from her book and had boys enraptured with her stories of the literary world. Her enchanting storytelling captured the hearts of ATC readers and with a talent for blending humour, mystery, and adventure, she has established herself as a true master of the written word. Spratt is best known for the Shockingly Good Stories, Friday Barnes, The Peski Kids and Nanny Piggins series of books all of which can be found on the bookshelves in Mt Sion Library!

Year 7 boys, who are currently reading 'Don't Call Me Ishmael' in their English unit, met the talented author, Michael Gerard Bauer as part of ATC's Book Week. Michael spoke to the boys about his writing process, gave insights into the development of the unique characters and offered fabulous tips on how to put the 'pieces of the writing puzzle' together. It's so great to see authors being treated like rock stars and that is exactly what happened as our book-loving boys rushed up at the end of his talk to get their own personal signed copy of 'Don't Call Me Ishmael'.

A colourful culmination to a fabulous week of celebrating books was the much anticipated 'Book Week Parade' where Junior School staff and students paid homage to their favourite book characters and impressed the judges with their dress-up creativity and fashion style!

We look forward to more events in the libraries as we continue to engage boys in the wonders of the literary world.

Kristy Taylor and Gwenda Burton