Book gifted to Magnus Church of England Academy pupils after inspirational visit from author
An academy’s year seven pupils have been visited by an author — and gifted a copy of his book.
Children’s author Nathanael Lessore recently paid a visit to Magnus Church of England Academy, Newark.
He spoke with year seven pupils about his average day as a writer, and discussed the inspirations behind his books, ‘Steady for This’ and ‘King of Nothing’.
They also had a chance to ask the author questions about his journey to becoming a published author.
Nathanael said: “I really enjoyed meeting the students. Through the questions and answers section, it became obvious they were not viewing me as ‘other’, or a stuffy author talking to them on a stage, but rather as someone with experiences they wanted to discuss. When students become comfortable to ask you such questions, I feel like I have done my job.
“[There were] lots of questions about being an author — and some about my favourite footballers too. But hearing that some of the students are intent on becoming authors, and wanting to succeed at that, well that would be a dream come true for me as well.
“That’s why the school visits are so enjoyable. You hope that you can inspire students to achieve their own goals, and importantly, I get to meet the people that I am writing for.”
Year seven pupil O-B Cross, who is already writing a series of books in his spare time, said: “I really enjoyed listening [to Nathanael] because I want to learn how to improve my own writing. I love writing my own books and find it’s a really good hobby. I have had a good day, listening to all the ways the author goes about writing and finding new stories.”
Every year seven pupil was gifted a copy of Nathanael’s book Steady for This — continuing an tradition at the academy which hopes to spark a love of reading in the young pupils.
Heather Jackson, Magnus’ learning resource centre manager, said: “We are proud to be able to gift our year seven students a book again this Christmas and we hope it will encourage them to keep reading through their time here at Magnus.
“We gift a book to every year seven because we feel reading is such a vital part of a student’s progression during their time in school, and this falls in line with our vision which is to develop people of good character.”
Assistant principal, Sarah Harper, added: “We are honoured to have Nathanael join us for the event and to talk to year seven about his experiences as a published author and his inspiration for the book. At Magnus we value the impact reading can have on our students, it’s so important that they get the opportunity to hear from a published author, to understand what inspired them, see where that creativity stems from and where that creativity can lead.
“We are proud of the attitudes and behaviour of year seven throughout the event and very impressed with the questions they asked of Nathanael after his talk. Well done year seven and we hope they enjoy reading this over the Christmas break.”
