Wigan primary school hosts 'The Masked Reader' event for World Book Day

Staff at Standish Lower Ground St Anne’s primary school will be celebrating the run up to World Book Day with its own take on the ITV singing contest, by hosting The Masked Reader.

The popular Saturday night show sees celebrities dress up in colourful costumes before taking to the stage to sing. The panel then have to guess who is behind the mask based on several clues.

Staff at St Anne’s have adapted the concept, and will have their faces covered and voices distorted while reading to children online. Pupils will then have to guess which teacher has been reading.

James Roughley, who teaches Year Six, said: “Schools do a lot for World Book Day every year, but this year it’s fallen in the final week of the lockdown. So the usual things like dressing up as book characters, isn’t going to be the same this year. With non-essential shops closed, we didn’t feel like we could ask children to dress up at home, but we still wanted to do something that celebrated reading, that we could share with all our kids from home.

“Over the week, up to World Book Day, we’ll have members of staff reading a book online, but they’ll have their face covered. They’ll also have their voice altered. We’ll reveal some clues about who is reading, so it could be ‘what was my favourite book growing up?’ etc.

“We’ll have them dressed as a fox, a frog, a dog. We’ll read a mixture, some teachers will be reading poetry, some will be reading parts of a novel, some are reading picture books.

“We’ll be uploading those every day, hopefully getting the kids to watch them and interact and listen to the stories, and guess which member of staff it is behind the mask.”

Mr Roughley joked that some of the St Anne’s staff were battling it out to become their chosen character, before filming their segments. The clips will be posted online in the days leading up to World Book Day on March 4, when all the mystery teachers’ identities will be revealed.

Mr Roughley added: “[World Book Day] is huge. Reading is at the heart of primary school teaching, it’s so important to every child’s development. Especially with libraries and book shops being closed, we need to make sure we are still giving children access to all these fantastic books that are out there.”

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