A creative teacher has helped the children in her school increase their love of books and stories with an activity-filled reading week.

Trudie Staples, a Year 2 teacher at Suttons Primary School in Suttons Lane, Hornchurch, packed a week full of author readings, writing workshops and story-telling sessions for the children.

“It was a wonderful week,” she said.

“I has been really fun and good to engage the children to get them excited about reading and books.”

On the first day illustrator Garry Parsons wowed the pupils with his drawings and held a successful workshop while the following day author Jack Trelawny held an assembly and story-telling session for each class.

The week was brought to a conclusion with a showcase and picnic for the students and their parents.

“It was definitely the highlight,” said Miss Staples.

“Each class focused on a book or author and did a lot of cross curricular activities.

“The weather was nice enough to sit outside and it was a really nice way to end the week.”

Year 6 children also sold second-hand books and held a raffle to raise money to buy new books for each classroom.

The experience doesn’t stop there for the Suttons pupils as they will now undertake a sponsored read over the next four weeks.

The Key Stage 2 children, aged seven to 11, will be tasked with completing 40 challenges, while Key Stage 1, aged five to seven, will tackle 20.

“It includes a lot of different things like designing a birthday card or writing a letter to an author,” explained Miss Staples.

“There are a lot of fun activities to complete.”