Hello, teachers!
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| The safety pins are secured, the sticky tape is standing by, and teachers everywhere are preparing to spend the week identifying book characters assembled from cardboard, face paint and sheer determination. |
| In this week’s newsletter, we’re celebrating the glorious chaos of Book Week, and asking you to send us your costume photos for the chance to be featured on our socials and a chance to win a prize. We’re also heading to Scotland with Squiz the World, sharing ready-to-go resources for Wear It Purple Day and finishing with the petrol station where customers danced their way to a discount. |
| Let’s jump in… |
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| Year 6 teaching team from Livingstone Primary School, 2025… Can you beat this excellent effort? |
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It’s Book Week: May the Sticky Tape Be With You
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Book Week is here  which means classrooms across the country are filling with wizards, superheroes, enormous cardboard contraptions and at least one costume that looked much simpler on Pinterest. |
| Teachers, we know what this week asks of you. Alongside the reading, parades and celebrations, you’ll be fixing fallen tails, pinning capes back into place and trying to work out how a child dressed as a vending machine is going to fit through the classroom door. Keep the sticky tape, safety pins and emergency stapler close. You’ve got this. |
| And please send us photos of you and your class getting into the Book Week spirit! We’re more than happy for you to blur students’ faces, or, if you don’t have the time or the tech know-how, just ask, and we can do it for you. Here are some early birds we’ve already received: |
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| Bryce as Pizza and Taco |
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| Axl as Maui |
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| Cruz as the Titanic |
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| Send your photos to [email protected](opens in new tab). We’ll feature some of our favourites on Instagram at @SquizKids, and there are prizes to be won too! |
| Happy Book Week, you wonderfully creative, costume-repairing legends!!! |
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Squiz the World – Unicorns, monsters and flying tree trunks…
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| This week we’re heading to a place where the national animal is imaginary, the most famous lake has a monster in it, and throwing a tree trunk counts as sport. Can you guess? |
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| This Tuesday, we’re firing up the Squiz Kids Super Fast Supersonic Jetliner for another Squiz the World, taking kids from the rugged Highlands and scattered islands to Scottish classrooms and dinner tables. |
| Along the way, we’ll discover why Scotland’s national animal is a unicorn, meet the legendary creature said to lurk beneath the waters of Loch Ness, find out why people throw giant tree trunks at Highland Games, explore the country’s traditions, and tuck into some very Scottish food. |
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| Teachers, you’ll find the brand new Squiz the World: Scotland episode in your podcast feed this Tuesday. |
| Kilts optional. |
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Add a splash of purple
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| This Friday, August 28, schools, workplaces and communities across Australia will mark Wear It Purple Day, a show of support for LGBTQIA+ young people. |
| It began in 2010 when Australian teenagers Katherine Hudson and Scott Williams wanted rainbow young people experiencing bullying and discrimination to know they weren’t alone. Today, wearing purple sends a simple message: You are welcome, valued and supported. |
| For schools, the day connects neatly with the Australian Curriculum’s focus on identity, belonging, respectful relationships and wellbeing, and with national expectations that schools create safe, inclusive environments for every student. |
| Wear It Purple has also done much of the teacher homework. Whether you plan a discussion about pronouns, classroom activities, an assembly or a full-blown purple colour run, there are free ready-to-go resources… including a colour run risk assessment(opens in new tab)! |
| Jump into the Wear It Purple resources(opens in new tab) |
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Fun Finish: What would you be prepared to do for 20% off fuel?
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| How about performing a small interpretive dance beside the counter at the petrol station? |
| Customers at a gas station in upstate New York were recently offered a great deal: dance for at least 15 seconds and get 20 per cent off their fuel and eligible purchases. And they did! |
| There were shimmies, spins, shoulder shakes and some gloriously enthusiastic moves. |
| Sadly, the promotion has finished, but the resulting video has now made millions of people smile. |
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What’s on this week?
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| Here’s what’s happening around the country and the world: |
It’s Children’s Book Week
National Skills Week August 24 -30 |
Monday, August 24 – Mount Vesuvius is traditionally believed to have erupted on this day in 79 CE, destroying Pompeii and Herculaneum
Tuesday, August 25 – Australian South Sea Islanders National Recognition Day(opens in new tab)
Wednesday, August 26 – International Dog Day
Thursday, August 27 – World Rock Paper Scissors Day
Red Nose Day(opens in new tab) – Get silly for a serious cause
Friday, August 28 – In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream”(opens in new tab) speech
– Wear it Purple Day
Saturday, August 29 – Deaf Festival Sydney(opens in new tab)
Sunday, August 30 – International Whale Shark Day
– Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, was born (1797)
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Know a teacher who’d love this? Pass it on.
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| That’s it from us for another week. Good luck to everyone navigating costume parades, last-minute character changes and the inevitable child who remembers at 8.47 am that they needed to be dressed as a dragon. |
| Please send your Book Week photos to [email protected](opens in new tab). We’d love to share them on Instagram at @SquizKids, and there are prizes to be won. |
| Until next week. |
| – Christie Kijurina, Squiz Kids Educator |
