Bridestowe Primary School is delighted to unveil their new outdoor reading shed where children are invited to pull up a beanbag and enjoy undisturbed hours immersed make-believe worlds.

The Friends of Bridestowe School (FoBS) worked incredibly hard to fundraise for this outstanding resource which was ceremonially opened on on World Book Day earlier this month.

Steff Williams, chair of FOBS, said: “It was a real team effort to get it ready for opening, with parents, staff and their family members giving up their weekends to provide a perfect environment for pupils to develop their love for reading.

“It was a delight watching pupils of all ages explore and enjoy this excellent space on the first day of opening.”

She explained: “We built the reading shed to provide a dedicated space for children to explore their love of books and to have a calm and quiet place to go at break times.

“Reading provides essential learning for everything from speech and language development to a child’s imagination. We hope the space will inspire more children to enjoy reading.”

The school will measure success through pupil feedback, higher quality conversations in school about what they have read and the children’s general attitude towards reading.

Bridestowe Primary aims for all of children to leave school as highly skilled readers by providing them with phonics (phonics is a method of teaching reading and writing that focuses on the relationship between sounds and letters, helping children decode words by sounding them out).

The phonics system is backed up by providing access to books in the library, in classrooms and lending books for taking home which match to their phonic knowledge.

FoBS thanked Countryside Furnishers from Launceston who kindly donated the carpet to make the space extra cosy.