St Mary's Primary School in Dorset investigate some impressive giant eggs

Possibly the biggest we've ever seen!

A teacher from St Mary’s Primary School in Dorset has forwarded me these fantastic pictures of their school’s Everybody Writes Day at the end of last year, inspired by the Giant Eggs projects here (and here) on the Everybody Writes website. We especially like that parents were invited to write as part of the day, something we know always seems to amaze children. What? Adults write too? Who would have thought?

One of my favourite projects on the Everybody Writes site is Everybody Writes - Don’t They?, a letter-writing project run by Weston Park Junior School in Southampton. The idea was very simple - for children to write to adults and ask how they used writing in their jobs. The amazement of children on receiving letters back from carpenters, builders and ambulance personnel in their local community, telling them how they used writing every day, was huge.

The idea of teachers and other adults writing alongside children as part of a communal project is a powerful one, and something we discussed at our recent Enthusiast workshops, where part of the days were focused on encouraging teachers to be writers too. Some comments were very revealing - “Now I know how the kids feel when I ask them to write something!”. Having to write creatively really reminds us what we ask of children, and makes us think about the best way to inspire them.

Giant eggs? School books? Mysterious occurrences? It’s just a day in the life of Everybody Writes.