Published on: 24 May 2023




Pre-Primary students recently enjoyed a visit from award-winning Australian Children’s author Kirsty Murray.

Based in Melbourne, Kirsty is an internationally published author whose work includes novels, non-fiction, historical fiction, junior fiction, speculative fiction, and picture books for children and young adults. Kirsty has also taught creative writing to writers of all ages in schools, libraries, and universities worldwide.

At Christ Church, we foster a culture of reading for pleasure, particularly among younger students whose language development and text comprehension is a critical aspect of their education and future academic success. With increased reading time, students are exposed to a wider variety of topics, such as geography, nature, history, and more, which offers them context when they encounter these subjects in the classroom. They also develop a sense of empathy by reading about others whose beliefs and cultures differ from their own.

Author visits are a fantastic way to encourage our boys to read for pleasure and inspire creative writing. Author visits are very exciting, as bringing in an author to the School environment humanises them and gives the students the opportunity to discover the original ideas that inspired their stories. By listening to an author read one of their books, the boys discover the art of storytelling and build language skills including vocabulary.

Kirsty spoke to the boys about character development and the ideas behind her creative writing. She then shared her new book ‘Shadow Catchers’, illustrated by Karen Blair, and conducted some fun activities playing with light and shadow.

Following Kirsty’s author talk with the Pre-Primary students, Year 5 boys from our Church Life Club took the opportunity to sit down with her to ask some questions about writing books and where her inspiration comes from. You can watch Kirsty being interviewed by Patrick King (Year 5) here.