By Mrs Gemma Wilson, Teacher Librarian

Wednesday, 21 May, marked the 25th anniversary of National Simultaneous Storytime (NSS) - a special event that brings students, teachers and families together across the country to share a story at the same time. This year’s featured book was The Truck Cat by Deborah Frenkel, a heartwarming tale about travel, companionship and finding family in unexpected places.

In the story, we follow Tinka the cat and his companion Yacoub as they journey around Australia in a truck. Their adventure takes a wonderful turn when they meet Mari and settle down to form a new kind of family. With its beautiful illustrations and uplifting message, The Truck Cat captured the imaginations of our youngest readers.

Although not every class could join the official live reading at 12:00 pm, all of our Kindergarten and Year 1 students enjoyed the story during their library sessions this week. One lucky class, KMH, happened to be in the Junior School Library at exactly midday on Wednesday and had the joy of experiencing the story at the official NSS time! More than two million students countrywide tuned into the live reading.

We were also thrilled to hear that The Truck Cat had been shortlisted for the CBCA Book Week Awards later this year. We’ll be keeping a close eye on the results in Term 3 as we continue to celebrate outstanding Australian children's literature.