A wonderful opportunity was presented to Carnarvon Primary School which could not be missed! Chrissy Sanderson offered to visit Carnarvon Primary School to read her very first children’s book about being kind to each other.
“How can we help our friend?” is a heart-warming story beautifully illustrated by Roger Parker. It tells the story of Cranky the cat who is feeling very unhappy. The animals react in such a super, positive and kind way because they want their friend to be happy.
During her first school visit to Carnarvon Primary School, Chrissy Sanderson had an opportunity to read her story to both of the Y1 classes, sharing her message about the importance of being kind to each other. The children were all very eager and excited to have an author visiting them and when Chrissy arrived the children in each class were sat patiently waiting for the story session to begin.
The children heard how the story was created as it all started by seeing Roger Parker’s pictures. The author told the children that once she set eyes on the pictures the words just flowed to create the story about Cranky the cat.
Teacher, Helen Sadler said: “Chrissy Sanderson read a lovely story about kindness to the children. They all really enjoyed hearing about the different animal characters and how they worked collectively to cheer up Cranky the cat. She encouraged the children to share smiles and be kind.” All the children shared a huge smile to Chrissy and then turned and smiled at each other which brought lots of laughter amongst them.
Maths was embedded into the reading session. Mrs Cork
created a tally chart on the white board and as all the children
stated what family pets they had; the tally chart data was added. The children could see from the tally chart which pet was the most popular. It turned out that cats and dogs were the favourite pets as both had seven marks each. Mrs Cork said: “The children were engaged in the story session and joined in really well with the
actions, some even hugged each other.”
Chrissy encouraged all the children to give each other a heart sticker; each child saying to each other “I am being kind, here is a heart sticker for you.”
The children in both groups took
on board the important message about being kind to each other. Chrissy hopes to return next year with another new story to share. She expressed her thanks to Carnarvon Primary School for inviting her to their school, adding: “It is the best feeling ever encouraging children to be kind to each other.”
Very soon, signed copies of “How can we help our friend?” story book can be purchased from Iris Blue, 4-6 Eaton Place, Bingham. Izzy Shouler, owner of Iris Blue stated she is very keen to support local businesses and currently she is using two local card companies.
At the end of October, Chrissy will be reading her story book in Bingham’s local library – details will be advertised locally.