Binfield Book Festivals

 

 

Binfield Book Festivals are a real tradition of our school. I can hardly believe they have been going so long, starting a year after the school opened. Val Biro and his veteran car Gumdrop were our first visitors.  There is nothing that inspires children to have a love of reading and writing more than author visits. That’s what makes them so worthwhile. Since then we have been fortunate enough to have four of the Children’s Laureates, Michael Morpurgo, Anne Fine, Michael Rosen and Jacqueline Wilson join us. Jacqueline Wilson returned for a second visit and has become a firm friend of the school.

 

 

From that first day with Val Biro, our week Book Festivals have grown to include illustrators, children’s editors, publishers, librarians and story tellers, as well as authors. This shows the children how many people are involved in bringing the book from an idea in the author’s head to our homes.

 

Authors who have visited our school have always been very complementary about the children’s knowledge of their stories or poems, making the visit so much more worthwhile for them. I have some very treasured letters! I would challenge any school to have had a more splendid line up of authors including some of the most famous and well regarded in the country…

 

Authors have included –

 

Allan Ahlberg                         poet

 

John Agard                            poet

 

Val Biro                                   illustrator

 

Val Bloom                                poet

 

Alex Brychta                         illustrator

 

James Carter                         poet

 

Keith Chatfield

 

Judy Corbalis

 

Pie Corbett                            poet

 

Peter Dixon                            poet

 

Ann Fine                                 Children’s Laureate

 

John Foster                           poet

 

Susanna Gretz                       illustrator

 

Pat Hutchins                          illustrator

 

Julie Killingback                    illustrator

 

Bill Laar

 

Wes McGee                            poet

 

Tony Mitton                           poet

 

Michael Morpurgo

 

Brian Moses                           poet

 

David Mostyn                         illustrator

 

Judith Nicholls                      poet

 

Peter O’Donnell                     illustrator

 

Gervase Phinn

 

Chris Powling                          poet

 

Jamie Rix

 

Michael Rosen                     poet, present Children’s Laureate

 

Nick Sharratt                       illustrator

 

Roger Stevens                      poet

 

Ron Van Der Mer                 paper sculptor

 

Phil Whitehead                      poet                                                               

  

 

Jacqueline Wilson                 Children’s Laureate                                

 

Jill Hanson      

Literacy Coordinator