Brendan’s cottage was a favourite place for Arabella, her younger brother and older sister and she has already used it as the setting for a ghost story. She would like to be a writer or actor, plays the violin and took the part of Dr Grimwig in the school production of Oliver. She loves reading: “I’m working my way through the top 21 of the Big Read at the moment.”

This is the fifth year that her teacher, Mari Girling, has entered students for the Write Away competition and the second time the school has produced a winner. “The materials are great”, she says and has built up a stock of them. Arabella’s class became “editors” of each other’s work, reading scripts anonymously and making suggestions for improvement.