Capel Primary School

Special Events

Harvest Festival 11th October

To celebrate Harvest Festival this year, we heard from two boys who live on a farm in Cambridgeshire, and they told us how important the Harvest was in their family. We learned about all the crops that they grow, and what happens to these crops, such as going to the shops, windmills or factories. We talked about our local farms and how lucky we are to be surrounded by farmers fields, and see the different stages of growth. Some of us have even seen the combine harvesters out in the fields.

Then, every class was able to share a celebration. Class 6 shared a poem, Class 5 performed a song with sign language, Class 4 performed the Scarecrow Rap and Class 3 did an acrostic poem. In Key Stage 1, we had Autumn wreaths, and two songs celebrating this time of year.

Headboy and Headgirl Investiture

27th September 2024

Today, we very proudly, awarded our new Headboy and Headgirl their badges in an assembly attended by their families and the whole school. They gave fantastic speeches in the election campaign, and have always conducted themselves in a friendly manner in school, resulting in lots of votes! They will now lead the School council to bring about changes that the students might like to see happen, and will represent the school for the year. Well done to Orla and Noah - you'll do a fantastic job!

Enrichment Day June 24.

We were delighted to hold a very special STEM Enrichment Day this term. We wanted to broaden children's idea of what STEM is, and show them how fun and easy it is to create big and small projects. We were lucky enough to be visited by Melanie and her Steam Lorry, which the children were able to explore and learn about. The found out how it worked and looked at fuel types too. Some classes were lucky enough to have rides around the playground as well. In addition, we hand some workshops delivered by Hands-on-science, who helped out children to explore wind turbines,  fireworks, skeletons and rockets. We all had a fantastic day, and the children were eager to share their learning with their families. 

World Book Day 2024

This year we thoroughly enjoyed 'Reading Our Way'. We started the week hearing about the Queen Consort's favourite books and how much she loved reading as a child. She told us how she reads to her grandchildren now, and really values sharing the stories that she grew up with, with them. On Thursday, we had a special assembly to think about what reading really means to us, and how we all enjoy reading in different ways. We love different types of books, enjoy reading in different places, and sometimes prefer listening to reading with audio books. Many of us dressed up too - either as a book character or in our pyjamas for that cosy bedtime story feel. We spent the day creating poems for our Poet-tree, hearing other adults read to us, and pairing up with other students to share books. We had a fantastic day and can't wait to spend our vouchers on a brand new book!

Young Voices 2024

The choir had a brilliant time at the O2 on Wednesday when they took part in Young Voices. They sang and danced with 8700 other children. They had worked hard at choir practice and in their own time to learn the songs and moves to enjoy an experience they will never forget. Urban Strides, Natalie Williams and M C Grammar joined the Young Voices choir to make it a spectacular evening. 

Huge thanks to Mrs Haffenden and Mrs Knight for taking our children and making it all possible.

New Lunchtime Provisions

January 2024

One of our school goals this year is to improve our lunchtimes, through providing a range of opportunities for learning, collaboration and enjoyment. The School Council have worked with Mrs Campbell and the SLT to see what children wanted outside. We came up with a plan following their survey. We have now created zones in the playground, giving each one a specific purpose and a dedicated adult.

Activity Zone - a large space where children are able to play team games, skip, use balance boards, use climbing equipment, space hoppers and much more. Children benefit from bringing in additional shoes to change into as it can get muddy!

Imagination Zone - a space to let your imagination run wild, with real-life resources, clothes, a stage and background scenes.

Calm Zone - a quiet space to sit with friends and chat, colour, play chess, play cards or watch the world go by.

Building Zone - a large area with different construction kits, including lego. Fantastic indoor space for collaboration or some quieter independent time.

Book Zone - our library is run by our older pupils who share books with others and encourage reading.

Fun Day of Fiction

Enrichment Day 30th November 2023

Capel Christmas Songs with West Kent Radio November 2023

We were invited to sing some Christmas songs for West Kent Radio. On 29th November, Lynn and her team came to the school to record us singing ' Mary's Boy Child' and ' It was on a Starry Night'. The school had rehearsed for a few weeks prior to this with the expert help of Mrs Haffenden! As a result, they sang beautifully. Our choir, also led by Mrs Haffenden, then sang a version of The First Noelle and Silent Night, which again was truly lovely. A few children also spoke to Lynn about their experiences of Christmas and what they were looking forward to.

www.westkentradio.co.uk

Capel Art Show July 2023

In the Summer, our curriculum has a Creative focus. The project work carried out in each class, is based around a creative element, be that Art, DT or Music. The children explore the NC requirements in a range of ways that are sure to engage, inspire and involve all our children. We wanted to share this work with our community, so opened up the school as an Art Gallery, whereby our visitors could see the range of work our children have been working on. It was also a great opportunity to see the skill development of our children, and to see the levels of work undertaken to create a finished article. In some classes, our guests were able to see the series of work from the first lesson to the last, and could see noticeable improvements and refinement of skills. In one class's DT project, our guests were told about the joining skills, planning and cutting skills needed to produce intricate labyrinths.

We would like to thank all of our pupils for working so hard - it was lovely to see every single child represented by their work. Thank you too to our guests for taking the time to visit us and talk about the work with our staff and children.

Pirates of the Curry Bean!
Wow, wow, wow!!
Year 6 put on the most fantastic show this week and enthralled audiences of pupils and parents. There was
an amazing cast that were guided through the whole performance by Narrator Eddie. We had inspirational
solos and duets from William, Summer, Chase, Molly and Evie. The acting was superb! The children showed
how confident they were on stage and really conveyed their characters well. Albert and Ruben had us in
stitches, the rats and monkeys kept the audience on their toes, and thank goodness for the Health and Safety
duo keeping everyone safe! Well done Lade and Loye!
I think we were all in awe at the amount of work the children put into learning their lines and the songs and
the sailor dance routine was highly entertaining. The Captain and Admiral certainly had their patience tested
by them. Well done to our Pirates too, led by the wonderful Red-beard.
Huge thanks to everyone who helped them to be so brilliant: Miss Buxton, Mrs Blakeway, Miss Creelman, Miss
Hobson and Mr and Mrs Gibb!
Oscars all round!

Enrichment Day June 2023

For our third enrichment Day of the year, we welcomed back The Outdoor Education Company, to help us try out new physical activities. Our KS2 pupils tried climbing, skateboarding, Laser Tag and Disc Golf, whilst our KS1 classes practised Circus skills, team challenges, boccia and archery. All the children had a fantastic day and we were so proud of how they all tried their best and reflected on their new achievements.

May Fayre 2023

The sun was shining beautifully to help us celebrate our May Fayre, run by our PTA. The event was circus themed, with special tents, a circus building competition, a clown teaching circus skills, bouncy castle and a ringmaster and ring mistress opening the event. Thanks to the hard work of the PTA and other helpers, we were able to raise just shy of £2500. Thank you.

King Charles III Coronation

May 5th

Today we celebrated this very special occasion, after spending the week learning about coronations and King Charles. We all dressed up in red, white and blue clothing and some of us brought flags in too. We shared a special assembly where each class presented some of their learning to the rest of the school and we sang a special coronation song. Our classes were also decorated to help us celebrate and we had a competition for the best class. Class 2 were the winners! They had bunting, paper chains and their very own King Charles.

Each child was able to take home a gifted commemorative leather bookmark and flag, as well as a gift from Mrs Cooper. 

Simon Mole

Visiting Poet 22nd March 2023

This week we had a very exciting visit from the poet Simon Mole. He gave us a performance in the morning which involved tales of animal football, messy bedrooms and used our own ideas to create a Capel tale. He then visited each class throughout the day to carry out some workshops with us. In year 5, we created our own spells linked to powers we wish we had. We had to think about what we would have to add to our spell and how we would cast them. Simon commented on how impressed he was by all the children at Capel, including their great ideas and participation.

Red Nose Day 2023

Red Nose Day

Thanks to donations, Comic Relief is able to support amazing projects and organisations who are making a difference for people across the UK and around the world.

Poverty isn’t simple, or easy to see. It’s behind so many of the issues that they work to tackle.

At Comic Relief, they’re there for people who are facing the toughest times of their lives. Whether they’re impacted by the cost of living crisis, the drought in East Africa, or the recent, heartbreaking earthquake in Syria and Turkey.

All year-round, the money donated to Comic Relief works hard to support some incredible projects making a change to people's lives across the UK and around the world. In fact, over a two year period, Comic Relief funding has helped to support 11.7 million people.

 At Capel, we wanted to be a part of this fantastic project, so we came to school being 'Redilicious'. We had read hair, red glasses, red clothes. red socks and lots of fantastic red noses. Our School Council organised the day and did a collection at both gates. We raised just over £180 in total - Amazing! Huge thanks to everyone who took part.

Pi Day

3.14 (March 14th)

Pi Day

A wonderful world of maths for the day. We investigated circles and worked in mixed year groups, and had a special assembly. We learned so much, so please quiz us at home!

Pi (often represented by the lower-case Greek letter π), one of the most well-known mathematical constants, is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter.  For any circle, the distance around the edge is a little more than three times the distance across.

Maths Enrichment Day March 2023

What a day! World of Maths helped us to think about maths in a different way today, and to see how it is all around us, all the time! We saw maths in nature, magic and puzzles. 

We learned so much from his interactive assembly and shows, and we were able to talk about it all back in our classes too. We spent the rest of the day being special maths investigators, exploring different concepts and honing our skills. One of the amazing parts of the day was the way we built knowledge. We started off using something that we know, for example our number bonds to 10, and then used that in larger and more complicated calculations. We even found out that it really is possible to jump through a piece of A4 paper !

World Book Day 2023

In March 2023, we all embraced books in the most wonderful way - by dressing up! Each of us thought about a favourite book or character, and made the day all about them. WE had a special assembly where we thought about what we like to read, where we like to read and why we like to read. We were also excited to receive our book tokens which we can use towards a new book!

We invite you to have a look at our costumes and props that we used. You can also find more pictures on the class pages.

Young Voices January 2023

Capel at Young Voices

Young Voices is the largest children’s school choir in the world! Children all over the country learn songs and dance moves with their school choir and then come together to perform.

After lots of hard work preparing, the choir and year 6 travelled to the O2 on Tuesday 17th January. They spent the afternoon rehearsing with the other school choirs, and the guest performers, so that by the evening they were ready to perform as the Young Voices Choir. The children learnt to beatbox with the Beatbox Collective, throw some shapes with Urban Strides – professional street dancers - and sang ‘Proud’ alongside Heather Small.

By the time the audience arrived, the atmosphere was electric and the choir performance ready. As the lights went down, the noise from the 8737 children in the choir was deafening. The children were pleased to see the C A P E L lights shining up from the audience where their families were sitting, and eagerly displayed the Capel banner from their seats way up high in the arena. They sang and danced for the whole evening and went home with memories that will stay with them forever, and hopefully inspire them to sing and dance just for enjoyment.

Enrichment Day December 2022

Music Extravaganza!

On Tuesday, we were lucky enough to have another Enrichment Day, this time focused around music.

We had three professional musicians visit the school to take workshops in African Drumming, Samba and Composition. Each workshop gave the children new experiences and the opportunity to play different instruments and learn how to create a song. We also had sessions on percussion instruments, a knowledge based quiz, an ocean themed concert and some fun singing and games.

Huge thanks to the children who were all so enthusiastic and participated fully. Thanks too to the staff for enabling such a fantastic day.

We are always happy to hear your feedback, so please do let us know any comments.

Sports Day

27th June 2022

On Monday, we had our first sports day for two years—and it was brilliant!

Thank you so much to everyone that was able to join us for the day to enjoy our field events, fun station, mini tournaments and traditional races. Special thanks must go to Mr Gibb who added such atmosphere to the day with his sound track and commentary. Thank you too the girls from Kent College Pembury for helping the day run smoothly.

We also show huge appreciation for Mrs Haffenden, who organised the day and made sure everyone had a great time.

Well done to all the children and family members who took part in our races and won! We saw some fantastic achievements, and of course, our overall winners THE VIKINGS, deserve an extra round of applause. 

We are so proud of the conduct of the children throughout the day. We saw amazing examples of peers supporting each other, generosity of spirit, true empathy and above all, kindness. We are also impressed with the sporting prowess and sheer determination that we saw. The resilience to try again, to try to beat their previous score and to keep going even when tired, was inspiring.

Enrichment Day

21st June 2022

On Tuesday, we were lucky enough to welcome some visitors to our school to help us learn how animals enrich our lives.

We welcomed the Kent Search and Rescue Team with their amazing dog, Scout. The team, Stuart and Martin, demonstrated how the dog uses the scent of human skin and the wind to find missing people, and how the dog then alerts the handler. It was such a privilege to see the team at work!

We also learned about the work of Guide dogs. We were visited by three different training pups over the day, and I think we all fell in love with them! They were so well behaved, and we found out about their training and how they offer practical help to people who have vision impairments. The handlers that joined the dogs, were so knowledgeable and eager to share their work with us. Huge thanks to Susannah Strawson for making it happen.

Class R had a special treat as they got to meet a range of very special therapy pets. They heard about the way the animals can help people just by being around them, and how stroking a pet can be very relaxing.

Our Amazing Animal World also spent the day with us. They took over our school hall and introduced us to a range of more unusual animals, all of which they had rescued. We met a hairless guinea-pig, a bearded dragon, a tortoise, a chinchilla, a snake, a hedgehog and some very well behaved rats.

We would like to express our sincere thanks to all those people who gave up their day for us and who made it a very special experience. It has generated so much discussion and understanding of how animals help us and make a difference to our lives. Hopefully it may encourage some to consider taking part in specialist training for Search and Rescue Dogs,  Guide dogs, or caring for rescued animals in the future!

May Fayre

14th May 2022

On Saturday, we were able to hold our first May Fayre for two years. It was fantastic! 

Thanks to our very hard-working PTA, our visitors were treated to a Cowboy themed afternoon of delights. We had the famous PTA BBQ providing much needed sustenance, a saloon, cake stall, raffle, fire engine display, pony rides, bouncy castle, local stall holders, games, gunge the staff and brilliant performances in the arena.  Stall holders and guests came in fancy dress and there was a Cactus competition too. Throughout the afternoon, our children showed off their skills in Maypole dancing, line dancing, street dancing and gymnastics. We were also lucky enough to have local musicians provide some great atmosphere. Well done to those that won in the raffle, the Best Cactus Competition, and of course, Gunge the Teacher. Mrs Maynard was delighted to be the first ever winner of this event, and she can't wait for next year!

Thanks to all those that helped make this event possible, and for our community for attending and making it such a success. 

Greg Clark visits Capel Primary School

6th May 2022

Today, we were pleased to welcome MP, Mr Greg Clark to our school. Following his  recent assistance with the power cuts, we thought he might like to meet the children that he helped. He started his morning watching our Anti-Bullying Assembly, where Year 5 helped us think about different bullying scenarios, and Year R shared their ideas of friendship with us. Joe and Jamie then helped us understand the effects that bullying can have on a person.

Mr Clark was then given a tour of the school by the Head Boy and Head Girl. He was able to see our classes in action, meet the guinea-pigs, see the Haven and hear about the different activities that we do. He was keen to hear about the Year 6 Leavers plans and when he saw the beans being grown by Year 2, it reminded him of his own time at school growing cress.

Finally, our School Council interviewed Mr Clark, asking him about his own school experiences; his favourite football team; his job as an MP, his views on local housing plans and his hobbies.

We thank Mr Clark for taking the time to visit us today.

Young Voices

4th May 2022

After many postponements, the choir and year 6 finally performed at Young Voices.  This year celebrated 25 years of Young Voices concerts, which have inspired hundreds of thousands of children to sing for pleasure. 

We travelled by coach to the O2 and spent the afternoon rehearsing for the main event.  We were taught to beatbox by the Beatbox Collective, and perform street dance moves with Urban Strides, as well as singing with the 2018 ‘The Voice’ winner, Ruti, who sang with Young Voices as an eight-year-old.

By the time the show started, the atmosphere was electric with 7500 excited children ready to perform to friends and family. The singing sounded amazing and the children looked like a professional choir dressed in their Young Voices t-shirts and showing off their dance moves! A fantastic and memorable experience was had by all.  

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Staff Appreciation Week

25th April 2022

We would like to say a heartfelt thank you to all of our families who joined us in showing our appreciation of our staff this week. We learned how much our children look forward to their school dinners, how kind our support staff are, and how important the help you receive in the office is. By dropping the member of staff in question a quick note, you really made their day. A few special staff moments during the week, as well as a cheeky doughnut on Friday, all went towards letting them know how much we value them.

Thank you

World Book Day

22nd March 2022

It was great to celebrate World Book Day together this year. We all enjoyed thinking about our favourite book characters, and dressing up. We had Cats in Hats, precious princesses, delightful Mary Poppins and a right pair of Twits! Our favourite authors, including Roald Dahl, JK Rowling and Shirley Hughes, were also represented via their brilliant character creations.

7th February - Children's Mental Health Week

GRAND OPENING

The Haven

We are delighted to be able to open The Haven today. Along with our wonderful PTA, we have been able to provide an environment for nurture, that also supports sensory needs. At the start of Children's Mental Health Week, it is especially important that we meet the emotional needs of our children, in a practical and sustainable way. Over the last few months, we have been planning the range of resources that children will be able to use to help with their own regulation. Today, our very own school council, proudly cut the ribbon to declare The Haven open. They were then able to explore inside and try out a few of the resources.

Huge thanks to everyone involved in the planning and fundraising of this project.

2nd  December - Enrichment Day

Learn a New skill!

On the 2nd December, we were excited to have another Enrichment Day. This time, we moved away from classroom lessons, to learn a new skill. In Key Stage 2 that involved a First Aid workshop, African Drumming, Forest School skills and a workshop to learn how to become an illustrator. In Key Stage 1, they learned how to use sign language and how to play the drums, keyboard and guitar. They also tried their hand at Indian Dancing and Circus skills. 

We had such a fantastic day, and the children were so proud of the new skills they learned.

Half Term Changes!

We have been very busy this October Half Term, with a few exciting changes. We have had an amazing History timeline installed in our corridor, showing events from the Stone Age to modern day. The children will have fun spotting the building of Capel school on it!  We have also given our library a facelift, can you spot your favourite book on our newly decorated windows?  And finally, our main hall now perfectly reflects our Capel values, with a large banner sitting proudly above the doors.

We are also delighted to have our new 'Haven' installed, with our interior finishes happening soon. The Haven will have multiple uses within the school, serving lots of our children. It will provide a Haven for students who need a calming space, this may be for addressing sensory needs, providing respite from the playground, or simply a quiet, safe environment. We are working with the PTA to ensure it has the equipment we need, and we hope to have it up and running very soon.

Fantastic Fred Visitors - October 2021

The Fantastic FRED Experience is a FREE live performance-led mental health resource for primary aged children delivered by a team of trained actors.

Enrichment Day June 2021

We were so lucky with the sunshine this week, as we enjoyed a wide range of sporting activities provided by The Outdoor Learning Company. It was amazing to see the children show courage and resilience as they tried new things, and many surprised themselves with how well they did. We were all so impressed with the way the children supported each other as they tried climbing, aeroball, laser tag, team challenges, skateboarding and much more.

5th May 2020

Today a photo of our school appeared in a national newspaper! It showed the fantastic art display dedicated to the NHS created by Miss Montgomery, Mrs Wickham and the children of some of our key workers. It's such a lovely photo of the school too, displaying our beautiful blossom tree. Thank you to all who helped create this.

ENRICHMENT DAY 20th March

Embracing a Growth Mindset Approach to overcome obstacles and work towards our aspirations.

On Tuesday, we were lucky enough to be visited by two inspirational speakers who motivated us to approach life and learning with a growth mindset.

Our first speaker was George Fouche— a retired South-African Rugby player and Olympic Coach—who shared how he has overcome obstacles in his own life. George grew up in in a challenging situation and had few aspirations or expectations for himself. However, through his love of Rugby, opportunities were presented and he learned very quickly to grab them with both hands. Throughout his life he faced difficulties, including a devastating injury that left him unable to walk for a long time. He talked to us about the importance of asking for and accepting help, of taking life’s opportunities and never giving up. He carried out workshops during the day with our younger pupils, setting them tricky tasks and emphasising the teamwork and support needed to complete them.

We also had Tim Hall from Bego Coaching lead our Year 4, 5, and 6 pupils through a series of tasks to enable them to explore the learning process and the importance of perseverance. They considered how important their attitude and approach was to education, that it was essential for them to be an active participant  and to be in the driving sea of their own learning.  Through simple tasks such as a pencil magic trick and juggling, they could see  the vital steps that they needed to go through before they could be successful. It really showed them that instant success was not realistic, that hard work and effort were the keys to success.

We would like to thank both of our speakers for their time and words of wisdom. We know it will support our children in their learning behaviours and be a fantastic example as they face little challenges in life.

Dare to Dream update 12th March - Football with Chelsea FC!

On Thursday, some of our aspiring footballers had a chance to experience their aspiration through our 'Dare to Dream' opportunity. We were visited by Steve Tapley who is Assistant Development Manager from Chelsea FC. He put our children through their paces in a coaching session that honed skills that would be practised in formal football club training sessions. He talked to our footballers about how to get into a footballing career, his history of playing for England under 15s and with Fulham and also shared with the children other aspirations that could link in with their skill sets, for example coaching. The children all had massive smiles on their faces by the end of the session and spoke with Steve about all their individual footballing aspirations.

Dare to Dream update - Science week, fossils experience!

This week we have been celebrating all things science! 2 of our children are aspiring fossil hunters so when geologist expert, Mr Sandy came to visit they had a great opportunity to quiz him about what it is like to be a fossil hunter. They also spent some 1:1 time with Mr Sandy to investigate some of his collection and ask him specific questions. We look forward to seeing what they dig up in the future!

World Book Day 2020

Thursday was a very special day at Capel as we celebrated World Book Day. So many of our children chose to dress up as their favourite book character and shared their very best books. In our special assembly, Mrs Waters led them in a book fashion parade where they posed as their favourite characters, some staff shared a summary of their favourite books and we learned about the fantastic book vouchers that they would receive. Throughout the day there were collaborative reading sessions between classes and a chance to explore the e-books. Finally, we were visited by our parents and carers at the end of the day to share a book. Each class had family members reading to each other, finishing the day in such an important way. Mrs Waters also received lots of entries for our Reading Vipers Poster competition and the lucky winner was announced in our Friday Assembly. First prize went to Jamie in Year 4 and he is the lucky winner of a voucher. Thank you to everyone who supported the children throughout the day and with their costumes.

DARE TO DREAM  27th February

On Thursday, Mrs Waters arranged for a very special assembly. Some professionals from our local area volunteered to take part in a  ‘What’s my line?’ quiz. The children had to ask questions to try and determine their career.  The range of careers was stockbroker, nurse, events manager, international development analyst and an Emergency Manager. It was very important to us that we try to broaden the children’s knowledge of the types of jobs that exist  to open up possibilities for them. It was fantastic to see the children use their investigative skills, asking a wide range of questions and making some educated guesses.

Years 5 and 6 were then able to take part in a ‘networking’ session with our visitors. They asked them more in depth questions about their jobs, what they liked about them and the career path that they took. For some of our children it encouraged them to think about certain subjects that they love and how they can use that to their advantage, for others it inspired them to want to go to university with specific courses in mind.

For any parents out there who feel that they would like to be involved in such a project, you may be interested to know that we have been working with Primary Futures who help volunteers match up with local schools.

Young Voices 2020

Huge thank you to Mrs Haffenden for organising this year's trip to Young Voices. The choir and their families had a fantastic time. The main message from the organisers of Young Voices was about having a Growth Mindset and tackling problems with resilience. This is so reflective of our approach to learning, and we were able to see it in action all day. The singing was beautiful and I know many of our children are itching to go back next year.

Dare to Dream update - 23rd January

On the 23rd of January we had a visit from Ray from the RNLI. Molly (year 6) had stated her aspiration as joining the RNLI. Ray talked with the whole school about seaside safety and shared some of the work that the RNLI do. He then spent some time in a Q&A session with Molly where he gave her some great contacts and talked to her about how she could get on track to start following her aspiration!

Dare to Dream update - 8th January

In preparation for the arrival of the guinea pigs that will soon be part of our Capel family we had a visit from the RSPCA. They told us all about how to care for pets and look after animals. Some of our aspiring animals then got to meet the RSPCA worker to ask her all about how she got into her role and what it was like to work for this charity. They asked some great questions and received some super advice about their future plans!

Dare to Dream update - 20th  November

We had the author Grant Strong visit our school. He talked about the book that he had written and then spent some time with a few of our children who are aspiring to be authors as part of our 'Dare to Dream' initiative. The Dare to Dreamers got to ask Grant all about what it had taken him to become an author, they then quizzed him for some advice on their own books that they were writing, leaving them feeling very inspired to get writing!