CILIP's Carnegie Medal shortlist 2019

CILIP's Carnegie Medal is awarded each year for an outstanding book for children and young people.

The 2019 shortlisted books are:

To find out more about the books and their authors, go to the Carnegie Shortlist web page and click on the book that you are interested in reading.

Happy reading!

Waterstones Book Prize 2019

The Boy At the Back of the Class by Onjali Rauf, a story about the refugee crisis from a child's perspective, has won this year's Waterstones Children's Book Prize and The Blue Peter Book Award 2019. 

The winner of the older fiction category went to Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi, an epic fantasy of magic and war and, according to the author, it is "an allegory for the modern black experience".  Like last year's winner The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, it is a fast paced and compelling read. Both novels are available to browse and borrow from the War Memorial Library.

The Boy at the Back of the Class is on our wish list - look out for it soon in the Discovery Library.

World Book Day 2019 Library Competition - winners announced!

We are delighted to announce the winner of our World Book Day 2019 Library competition! Tara H in Year 8 correctly identified the most teachers and which characters and from which books they came.  Four runner up prizes were also awarded to other Year 8 students Josh, Elsie, Nehir and Rowan, who impressed the Librarians with their efforts.  A runner up prize was given to Tommy-Lee from The Eden Park High School, who correctly identified the most number of Eden Park High staff.

The prize for the Department whose costumes were spotted by the most number of students in our Competition goes to the English Department who were Shakespearean characters!

The English Department in their amazing WBD costumes

Congratulations to the winners and thank you to everyone who entered!

The Children's Laureate - Celebrating 20 Years

Waterstones Children's Laureates drawn by Chris Riddell: from Flights of Fancy taken from the Book Trust website

Originally devised by poet Ted Hughes and author Michael Morpurgo, the Waterstones' Children's Laureate is appointed every two years to an esteemed writer or illustrator of children's books for exceptional achievement in their field.

Former Laureates including illustrators Quentin Blake and Anthony Browne, authors Anne Fine, Jacqueline Wilson, Malorie Blackman and Michael Morpurgo, poet and author Michael Rosen and author and illustrator Chris Riddell.  The current Children's Laureate (2017-2019) is author and illustrator Lauren Child, whose excellent Ruby Redfort books can be browsed and borrowed from the Discovery Library.

Carnegie Longlist 2019

The Carnegie and Greenaway long lists were announced on 19th February.  This year's Carnegie list is a very diverse in theme and style, reflecting contemporary issues such as gender, refugees, women's rights, depression and assisted suicide.  There are first time to the list authors such as Kwame Alexander for Rebound and Jason Reynolds for the amazing Long Way Down as well as previous nominees David Almond, Philip Reeve, Sally Gardner, Sarah Crossan and Frances Hardinge.

This image appears on the CILIP Carnegie and Greenaway Awards website 

The short lists are announced tomorrow, 19th March 2019 and shadowing begins!  At TRS, we are really looking forward to taking part in the Carnegie Shadowing Scheme again this year with a group of our Year 9 students.  Excitingly, there is a new award, the Shadowers' Choice Award, which will be voted for and awarded by the young people in the Shadowing Groups.  It will be announced alongside the Medal winners in June.

CILIP's Carnegie Medal is awarded each year for an outstanding book for children and young people as part of the Carnegie and Greenaway Children's Book Awards.  The Shadowing Scheme is an opportunity to 'shadow' the judging process for the Carnegie Medal.  This involves reading, discussing and reviewing the eight shortlisted titles.  The medal winners are announced on 18th June 2019.

Jacqueline Wilson Creative Writing Competition

Are you aged 12 and under, a lover of Jacqueline Wilson books and do you enjoy writing stories?  If the answer to these questions is YES, then this competition is for you!  Simply submit your story of between 750 and 1000 words online, making sure you meet the terms and conditions.

The winner will have their story published in a Jacqueline Wilson book and will also receive a First News subscription, vouchers, a book bundle for their school library and a school visit from Jacqueline Wilson.  For more information, click here.

We have lots of Jacqueline Wilson books in the Discovery Library for you to browse and borrow.

International Women's Day 2019

Today is International Women’s Day (IWD) and this year's theme is #BalanceforBetter, and is call to action to build a gender balanced world.

Celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future, IWD can be traced back to the Suffragettes, who campaigned for women’s right to vote in late 19th and early 20th Century.

Sally Nicholls' inspiring novel, The Things A Bright Girls Can Do, follows the fortunes of three young women fighting for the right to vote and is available to borrow from the War Memorial Library.

World Book Day 2019 celebrations

This year's TRS and Eden Park High School World Book Day celebrations took place on Thursday 7th March, with staff and Year 7 dress up, Drop Everything and Read and Library competitions. 

Fantastic staff posing in the War Memorial Library - spot the Librarians as The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe on the left!

The Librarians dressed up as The Lion, The Witch and Wardrobe, the second book in the Chronicles of Narnia series by C.S. Lewis, complete with homemade wardrobe costume and Turkish Delight! We mounted World Book Day displays in both Libraries to promote and encourage reading for pleasure; sorted and distributed World Book Day vouchers to KS3 and 4 forms; and created bookmarks, which were given out on the day.  In addition, our brand new WBD 2019 competition attracted lots of attention, with the winners to be announced very soon!

The Small Hall was decorated with short stories written by the students and strung up like bunting, organised by the English Department.  Ms Troddyn hosted primary school students from Mottingham and Scotts Park who participated in an interactive writing workshop. 

Below are a selection of the TRS staff costumes:

The Design and Technology Department

The English Department

The Science Department

The PE department

The Geography Department

Miss Bisbal from MFL as Snow White

World Book Day 2019

World Book Day is a day set aside each year to celebrate reading, books, authors and illustrators. This
year it takes place on Thursday 7th  March.

At TRS, we'll be dropping everything and reading, there'll be staff dressing up, Library COMPETITIONS, with lots of prizes to be won!  Look out for the special WBD displays and blog posts too!

WBD in the DL

Writes of Passage in the WML

Today, Wednesday 6th March, our brand new whistlestop World Book Day 2019 Library competition launches.  Find out which teachers were which characters from which book on World Book Day. The student who identifies the most teachers correctly wins a prize!  To enter, simply pick up a form from the Discovery Library and hand in your entry by Friday 8th March.

We are also looking for some brilliant book reviews to post on the Library Blog - ask one of your Librarians for a template.


Don’t forget our regular Word of the Week competition!

Home Room Tutors will be giving out special World Book Day tokens to each pupil, with the exception of the Post 16 students who can collect one from the War Memorial Library on request. These vouchers can either be exchanged at participating bookshops for one of the World Book Day books or they can be used to get £1 off any book costing £2.99 or more.

You can use your voucher in any participating books shop until 31st March 2018.

The YA Book Prize 2019 - Shortlist Announced

The Bookseller’s YA Book Prize 2019 shortlist has been announced.  The list contains 10 books and covers themes of identity, mental health, first love, friendship and nationalism, which are pertinent to real-life issues happening now.

Among the authors that have been shortlisted are former winner Louise O'Neill for The Surface Breaks, a re-imagining of The Little Mermaid fairytale; Juno Dawson for Clean, the story of a spoilt rich girl recovering from a near fatal drug overdose; I Am Thunder by Muhammad Khan, inspired by the story of three British school girls travelling to Syria to join the Islamic State; and Goodbye Perfect by Sara Barnard.

The BookSeller's YA Book Prize 2019 - shortlist

Some of the shortlisted novels are available to borrow from the War Memorial Library.  The overall winner will be announced on Thursday 30th May at Hay Festival.

Bicentenary of George Eliot

George Eliot at 30 by François D'Albert Durade

Hailed as one of the greatest 19th Century writers, 2019 marks the bicentenary of the author George Eliot.  Born Mary Ann Evans on 22 November 1819, Eliot used a male pen name to make sure that her novels were taken seriously at a time when female authors were usually connected with romantic fiction.

Her novels include Silas Marner and Middlemarch, both of which are available to borrow from the War Memorial Library. To find out some intriguing facts about George Eliot click here.