Bookmark competition

The Doon Academy winner of the National Book Tokens bookmark competition was Siobhan Robinson (S1). Her design of a bookworm and Read 15 minutes a day was felt to be the most encouraging. The runners-up were Fraser Buchanan and Shannon Brown.

In the Dark

For our March book the staff group read In the Dark by Mark Billingham. It's a fast paced detective mystery set amongst the gang culture of London with some surprising twists in the plot. Most of the group really enjoyed the book, especially as the setting was so different from here. It was also complete different from our previous book, Who's that girl?
At the meeting we swopped some of our own books too. One Day by David Nicholls is working its way around the group having been highly recommended. The Harry Hole series of Norwegian crime thrillers by Jo Nesbo is also popular.

S1 Readers' Cup

Raecar, the winners!


Thursday 18th March saw the S1 round of the Readers' Cup competition. Teams from all 4 clans answered questions on Cathy MacPhail,Christmas, Baddies, Families and of course the Lucky dip round. Raecar led from the start and were clear winners. Bradan and Doon fought neck and neck until Doon ended up 2 points ahead in the final round.

The results were First Raecar, then Doon, Braddan and Finlas.

As usual, between round the audience had a chance to test their knowledge and answer some of the questions.

Congratulations and well done to all who took part.

Some of the winning team will go on to represent Doon Academy at the East Ayrshire final in June.




Audience participation!






During the quiz!







Raecar hard at work!

Theresa Breslin

A group of S2 pupils led by Miss Borthwick and Mrs Bax travelled to Kilmarnock Acacemy to hear the famous author Theresa Breslin talk about her work. She told us about using solid objects like shrapnel and gas masks to help with her ideas for stories. She explained about the 3Ps that she uses - People, Place and Plot, which are the ingredients of a good story. Ms Breslin read excerpts from Remembrance Divided City and told the pupils about the background to the stories. To help keep everyone interested there was a raffle with her books as prizes.
At the end she signed pictures of her book covers. Ross Tait asked a question and won a signed poster of Divided City.

Readers' Cup S2

Friday 12th March saw the hotly contested S2 round of the Readers' Cup quiz. The question topics were Keith Gray, Lucky dip, Crime & detectives, Horror and Scottish connections. The quiz was closely contested until the last rounds when leaders started to emerge. The winners were Raecar with a clear lead of 3 points over their next rival Doon. Thanks for S6 pupils for marking the quizzes.

Keith Gray trip

On Tuesday 9th March, Mrs Dorans' S2 class went to Auchinleck Academy to hear the famous author Keith Gray. Keith was very entertaining and told stories about his childhood adventures, travelling with his friend to Keith in Scotland and being a bear in a carnival parade. He also read from some of his books. Everyone enjoyed the event and thought he was great fun.

Cathy MacPhail visits Doon

The famous author Cathy MacPhail visited our library on Monday 8th March and spoke to S1 as well as some visitors from Auchinleck Academy as part of our Spring Read programme. Cathy chatted to pupils for an hour on her books, how she gets her ideas and what makes a good story. She has inspired some of our budding writers to put pen to paper.