The UKLA is delighted to announce the winner of the “Our Class Loves This Book Award”:
Stephen Dilley and 9C English, from Kendrick School, Reading
Stephen and his class studied The Crossing, by Manjeet Mann. The panel loved the way this piece of work emerged from the Year 9’s ongoing study of racism in 1930’s America through their reading of Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor, and then developed its own momentum.
In his submission, Stephen describes how his students, who were neither familiar with, nor open to verse novels, not only loved the genre, but were keen to share and perform their own writing in this style.
Alongside his reflective commentary about the unit of work, Stephen has shared some examples of his students’ work, beautifully annotated, which shows their sensitivity to the issues raised in the text – grief, homelessness, prejudice, immigration – and their own growing ability to work within the genre of verse novels.
By the end of this set of lessons, it is clear that Stephen’s class “love this book” – they were queuing up to borrow it – but had discovered a new genre and new writers to enjoy.
Stephen will be presenting his work and receiving his award at the UKLA International Conference on Saturday 6th July 2024.
Submissions for the 2025 “Our Class Loves This Book” award, based on the UKLA Book Awards shortlist from 2024, will open in September. The award is sponsored by Prue Goodwin. This award encourages teachers to explore a book in detail, by not only looking at the author and the text, but also immersing their classes into worlds of possibility thinking. Teachers may decide to use their chosen book as part of a theme they are teaching with their children, it could be an author study, or maybe a one off exploration – the choice is theirs! The response can be presented in any way, e.g. through information technology, dance, art, drama, writing, music, spoken presentation or any combination of these.