PHSG students shadow the judging process at the Yoto Carnegies.
Last week, our Year 8 and Year 9 students attended the Yoto Carnegie Medals for Writing and Illustration, hosted at Plymstock school. They delivered a presentation on their assigned shortlisted book, 'Choose Love' by Nicola Davies in front of a large audience from eight local schools.
Every year, thousands of groups of students from across the country get together and ‘shadow’ the judging process for the Yoto Carnegie Medals for Writing and Illustration- the UK’s longest running children’s book awards. It promotes modern, diverse literature of all genres and celebrates a love of reading. They are unique in that they are judged solely by librarians.
This year, our local shadowing event was hosted by Plymstock school. A group of six Year 8 and Year 9 PHSG students attended. They were one of 8 schools from across the city tasked with promoting one of the 8 shortlisted books. The book we were given was ‘Choose Love’ by Nicola Davies, a collection of poems highlighting the plight of people forced to leave their homes and seek asylum in other countries.
The group met each week, giving up part of their lunch break. They spent time discussing the poems and reflecting on the emotions they evoked. They used Nicola’s poems as the basis from which to create their own poems, they incorporated the words of the poem into the illustrations and they discussed their interpretations of the abstract illustrations. They also contacted local refugee charity DCRS to help gain further insight into the experience of asylum seekers in Plymouth.
After lots of background work, the students put together a presentation, proposing why the book should win the award. It was a heartfelt and moving performance, delivered with confidence, maturity and compassion. They shared the work they had done around the poems and how each poem made them feel and they created a thought-provoking short video with sound bites from politicians and activists. A member of staff at the presentation commented on their efforts. He thought it was “incredibly sensitive and thoughtfully delivered” and noted that the students “had clearly gone above and beyond in researching the topic of immigration and the hardship those seeking asylum face.”
After the presentations, they watched a live stream of the ceremony in London, followed by a talk and a book signing from the author of one of the longlisted books, Rachel Delahaye. There was also a book sale. Between the six participants and staff, they bought 21 books! This included Rachel Delahaye’s book (‘Electric Life’) signed by the author ready for our library. Look out for it on the Plymouth High shelves!
It was a fantastic day, sharing a love of books and reading. We would like to applaud the students’ hard work and dedication preparing for the event. It took bravery to perform in front of a large audience of teachers, librarians, their peers and published writers. They were excellent representatives of the Plymouth High spirit, our passion for reading and extra-curricular endeavour.
‘It was a really enjoyable experience, and it was just overall fun. I really like the author's talk, and it was nice to hear about her experience as a writer.’ – 8L.
‘I really enjoyed watching the other schools’ performances and hearing how they interpreted the books. It was super fun working with others in the library and creating a piece with them before the day.’ – 8L
‘I loved watching the great performances and also performing to other schools. Working with others is fun as well.’ – 8L Nicole
‘The experience of Carnegies was really enjoyable as the performances were really good. The author talk and getting to interact with the other schools was awesome, too.’ – 8T
‘We found the author's talk very interesting, and we enjoyed presenting our piece to the other schools. It was fun working together to create our presentation, and we liked going to the book sale.’ – 9K
Quotes from students: