- Please let us know your school will be entering by emailing us at courses@cambridgescp.com.
- Familiarise yourself with our latest Guidance Document for more on our category guidelines, student permission requirements and terms of entry.
- Teachers to complete the online registration form and submit winning entries (no more than one entry per category) to courses@cambridgescp.com by Friday 17th November 2023.
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Welcome to the home of CSCP's Ovid Competition!
The Cambridge School Classics Project welcomes entries from Year 7 students across the UK for this year's Ovid Competition.
Every autumn, classes make use of our free Classical Tales retellings of Ovid's Metamorphoses, and students come up with a creative response to the myths in any one of our four categories:
Performance
Artefact
Creative Writing
Animation
Students can create entries as individuals or in groups of up to four. Each school can submit up to one entry per category by the deadline in November, and winners of the competition will be announced by our expert panel of judges during an online prize-giving event in December.
Want to hear Ovid Competition news before anyone else? Sign up to our Ovid Competition mailing list here.
Classic Tales are storytelling resources created by CSCP in partnership with tellers Hugh Lupton and Daniel Morden. Based on "The Metamorphoses" by the Roman poet Ovid (1st century CE), Tales of Change provides 20 oral retellings of famous Greek myths, ranging from ancient stories of creation to the deceptive relationships between the gods and humankind.
Ovid's stories often return to the themes of change and transformation: this is the meaning of the word "metamorphoses". They explore the unpredictable nature of fate and the ways people strive to make sense of themselves and the world they live in, themes that are echoed in much of world literature and continue to inspire storytellers across the globe today.
The stories in Tales of Change are intended to promote literacy skills at KS3 by utilising the power of stories and oral storytelling.
The resources have been designed for flexible use in classrooms. They can be taught in full and sequentially, or they can be approached in smaller groupings for those with less classroom time or who are teaching remotely or off-timetable. Suggestions for picking which stories to use in your classroom can be found here.
As well the audio recordings, each story is accompanied by summaries, transcripts, teaching suggestions and weblinks.
For teaching suggestions on using stories and Classical Tales in your classroom, take a look the advice from CSCP's Director, Caroline Bristow.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Our judges have long been inspired by the myths of the ancient world and each of them is a different kind of storyteller, whether through the written word, performance or animation. Learn a little more about them below.
Performance
Hugh Lupton
Hugh has been working as a storyteller for forty years, and more recently as a writer as well. He tells stories from many different cultures. He has performed in schools, arts centres, theatres, prisons, village halls, at fairs, festivals and historical sites, all over Britain and in many other parts of the world. With Daniel Morden, Hugh has been the CSCP’s storyteller of choice for their Greek Myths project, and his is often the voice you can hear on Classical Tales!
Artefacts
Dr Rosanna Omitowoju
Rosanna is a Fellow in Classics at King's College, Cambridge. You can read more about Rosanna's work here.
To find out more about what Rosanna will be looking for from winning entries this year, take a look at the video below.
Creative Writing
Caroline Lawrence
Caroline is the best-selling author of numerous books for children, including the Roman Mysteries and the Roman Quests. Take a look at this tip from Caroline's book How to Write a Great Story here.
For more hints and tips for entries in the Creative Writing category this year, take a look at the video below.
Animation
Steve K. Simons
Steve is one of the founders of the Panoply Vase Animation Project, and has been making animations inspired by the ancient world and its artefacts since 2007. You can see some of Steve's animations here.
To find out what Steve will be looking for from winning entries in the animation category, take a look at the video below.
Prize-giving will take place online on the afternoon of Thursday 7th December (1:45 pm to 4:00 pm), and will be a fabulous opportunity to celebrate the outstanding talent of our year 7 entrants. Students will enjoy a storytelling performance by Hugh Lupton, take part in an Ovid Challenge quiz, and have the opportunity to meet our judges who will announce the winners in their categories during an awards ceremony presentation.
More details about the event this year will be available closer to the date. Every student who enters the Ovid Competition receives a certificate and winners in each category receive a prize.
Here's where you can see winners and competition entries from previous years.
We are delighted that the charity Classics for All have been inspired by our work and have launched several of their own Ovid Competitions via their regional hubs in Bristol, the West Midlands and Liverpool. While we support these great events and are pleased that people are enjoying our materials, these are not CSCP events and are not connected to the official Classic Tales Ovid Competition. If you are looking for information on one of these competitions please contact your regional Classics for All representative or follow the links below.
