We were fortunate to have Felice Arena visit our school to inspire our girls from Year 4 to Year 6 to read and delve into the world of books normally considered for ‘boys’!
Felice dispelled that notion. He first commented how our girls introduced him as Mr Arena….cleverly avoiding pronouncing his name! Felice shared fabulous stories of the names he has been called, including Felicity! His name means happy in Italian and is pronounced Feh-LEE-chay.
Felice spoke fondly of his life so far, of being a teacher, actor (older folks may remember him from Neighbours), childrens TV presenter, swimmer and a buddy to legend AFL player Gary Lyons. Felice quickly engaged the girls with AFL ‘skills’ explaining a ‘specky’, everyone had so much fun using slow motion to set the scene.
Before introducing his latest book ‘The Boy and the Spy’, Felice, who is often inspired
to write by music, played music for the girls and brainstormed words evoked by the music. The background and setting of the story was shared and it involved …..code! 
Felice gave the girls a little history of Morse code and semaphore and the significance of cracking code during WWII. By creating funny body signals the girls coded the word ‘LOVE’, they thoroughly enjoyed the activity and no doubt there will be many body coding actions happening around the school.
Felice’s visit has ignited interest and delight in books mostly associated with ‘boys’. It was an outstanding author visit.
Thank you Felice, just have to share this photo 🙂
