CREATING an engaging reading space – with a dash of pizazz – is the plan at Oldbury Park Primary School.
The St John’s school has a space earmarked and the children have put forward their ideas on how to fill it – but how the area will eventually look is down to you.
The reading space is the proposal put forward by the school as part of our Cash for Schools giveaway.
We have teamed up with Western Power Distribution to offer £25,000 to be split between the 30 South Worcestershire schools on our shortlist.
Your votes will decide which school gets the lion’s share of the prize money. Will it be Oldbury Park?
Rebecca Hall, assistant head at Oldbury Park Primary School, said: “We’ve had a big clear out of the foyer.
“It’s a lovely space and we want to make it into a really engaging reading area.
“As well as welcoming people into the school it would be a really good space for the children to use.
“We put it out to the children for their thoughts. We really wanted to involve them in it. They have created some lovely ideas of what they think they want the reading area to be like.
“I’ve got a display up at the moment saying ‘watch this space’ and we will pick from the best ones to put together a really fantastic story area.”
Miss Hall said the ideas ranged from colourful furniture, to cardboard cut-outs of favourite characters and a beanstalk running up a pillar.
She said: “The children have come up with some brilliant ideas but how much money we raise will dictate how much we can buy or make ourselves.
“It would be so special for the children to have as much money as possible to add that bit of pizazz.”
Behind the idea for the reading area is a desire at the school to instil a real passion for reading among the pupils.
Miss Hall said: “It’s not enough to give them a story and say ‘you’ve got to read it’.
“It’s all about getting children to want to read.
“We think we can do that by giving them the opportunity to choose books and have a nice space where it’s relaxing to enjoy them.
“Unfortunately not all children get story time at bed times so it’s trying to create a nice cosy space for them to read in school as well.
“We want to create a really lovely story time experience.”
You will find voting coupons in the paper every day for you to collect and send in to vote for your favourite projects.
You may send in as many coupons as you wish and vote for as many schools as you wish.
The school with the most votes will win the £5,000 top prize but the prize money will be shared between all 30 schools.
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