From Poems to Plays, Students Showcase Talent at Literary Olympiad

This year’s literary Olympiad was held at Hethersett Academy, with performances from students across Inspiration Trust. Poems, speeches and plays were performed over the course of the day, with a lot of talent shared. Ashley Hickson-Lovence (pictured above), author of ‘Wild East’, joined us on the day for the Olympiad and helped judge some of our competitions, alongside treating our students to a poetry performance workshop.

Starting with poetry, there were performances of original student poems, they were fantastically written and based on the theme of Crossing Frontiers. In the following category poems authored by students were performed by their friends or a staff member and poems were judged on the content of their writing.

After the initial performances, Ashley Hickson-Lovence ran a short workshop on poetry performance. Our students watched in awe as Ashley described his process for reciting his poetry, and techniques he uses to learn poetry off by heart. Students were treated to the performance of an extract from the start of ‘Wild East’, before practicing performing to each other in pairs.

Our final part of the poetry competition was for the recital of a pre-existing poem. Lots of students had rehearsed and prepared their favourite poems for the Olympiad from their favourite authors such as Robert Frost and Lewis Carroll. There were many exciting entries with some schools incorporating props and drama to their performances, an intense performance of ‘Boots’ by Rudyard Kipling featured marching on the spot in rhythm to the poem and immersed the audience in the poem.

Ben Arscott , Reading Strategy Lead
“The event was a lovely celebration of all things literary. We were amazed by the passion and dedication shown by the pupils. In each round, the judges had agonizing decisions to make about who should be the winner. This is testament to the literary talent across our trust and the hard work of librarians, English teachers and other staff who have supported our pupils.”

Students then listened to a Q&A with Ashley, he spoke about his writing process and some of the influences for his own writing. It was very insightful for our students to hear about some of the struggles in writing that they might face, especially around writers block and some tips to spark creativity.

The book shadowing contest was voted for in the break, where there were four books to choose from: The Island at the End of Everything by Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Saint Death by Marcus Sedgwick, Song Walker by Zillah Bethell and Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson. Our students have been encouraged to read all four of these books as part of the Olympiad and lead by librarians in each school have been discussing the themes and what they like and dislike from each novel.

Speeches followed, with students asked to deliver a 3-minute speech to persuade the audience on the theme of ‘Why travel when you can read?’. Compelling arguments were given for exploring the world through a book, especially the feeling of escapism at a much cheaper price than a plane ticket!

A pop-up book shop arrived just before lunch to set up for students to browse on their break from Book Bugs and Dragon Tales, for which there was a lot of excitement and a very busy stall! Students were able to spend book tokens and buy some of the fantastic books on offer.

Finally, there was a set of 5-minute plays performed on a theme of ‘the best bit of travelling home’ with some thought-provoking pieces that were planned and performed excellently. Students did a fantastic job of preparing for their performances and the atmosphere throughout the whole day was extremely supportive.

Our winners for the day were:

Most Read Around the World books read - Acacia Clarke

Reader of the Year (pupil who has taken out/read the most books) - Yomna Ayderoos

Best Performance of an original poem - Tilly Holbrough, India White and Holly Bluett

Best submission of an original poem - Goda Zilinskaite

Best recital of a poem - Eda Revuckaite and Alyssa Bassett-Oldfield

Best speech - Joyce Hui

Best five-minute play - Alice Hills, Edward Rakhit, Obi Birhouse, Max Crowhurst, Beau Berwick  and Luke Hood

Announcement of winner of the book shadowing - Saint Death by Marcus Sedgwick