by Ashlee Kaminski, Grade 3 Homeroom Teacher -

Recently, three students from TK campus entered Sarah Brennan’s Mischievous Monkey Story Competition. Manas Agrawal and Leela Strathern submitted their stories in the younger category, for Grades 1 to 3, and Grade 6 student, Abigail Bilsland competed in the Grade four to six category.

In the younger category, Sarah Brennan noted that it was a “stiff field of 12 entries from 7 schools in Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia” and Leela’s story, The Owner of the Teapot, won her second place! Leela has been writing since she was five and finds writing is a great place where she puts all of her excitement and adventures in imagination but also a medium where she can express herself. Her ideas come from everywhere, including books she has read, films she has watched and real life experiences. Leela plans to enter future writing competitions. Although Manas didn’t place, Sarah noted that he had clearly put in a lot of effort into his story and looks forward to seeing his writing in the future.

In the Grade four to six category there were 31 entries from 17 schools in 5 different countries, yet Abigail Bilsland’s story, The Story of Princess Malala Monkey, won first place! Abigail started writing for pleasure last year, but has been creating stories for years for her younger sister. She gets most of her inspiration from dreams she has had or conversations she has had with others. In fact, her submission for the competition came to her in a dream after her class had visited the Peranakan Museum.

Congratulations to all the writers. A job well done! Leela and Abigail’s stories are still available online.