The gates, of course, belonged to kiddies favourite Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The year five pupils also saw artefacts from Roald Dahl's life, read his school reports (he was quite a good writer), sat in a replica of his hut, dressed up in clothes from the films and enjoyed a writing workshop in Miss Honey's Classroom (from Matilda).

The children also walked through the village matching up extracts from the books with their settings. A favourite was the library where the tiny Matilda used to read when her mum went to Aylesbury to play bingo!

Giant footsteps guided the children through the churchyard to find the author's grave.

All the children were given a special notebook to carry around with them, like Roald Dahl used to, so they could capture characters and ideas at any time.

Head of Year Five, Christine McElhone said: “It was wonderful to see the children enjoying themselves and learning so much about one of their favourite authors.

“The visit will help to enrich their own writing as when they returned they were full of ideas for their own stories.”