Reading with kids

The Guardian and Observer are publishing a two part guide to reading with kids this weekend. It sounds useful, they say:

For more expert opinion, useful tips, and the very best in children's reading from picturebooks to pacy teenage fiction, discover our two-part guide to Reading with Kids, free in the Guardian and Observer 22-23 October 2011

I think I'll buy it myself (and I'm usually now a read-the-papers-online kinda gal) to see if I've missed any good titles we should have in the Library. Also, because the advertising video is great  - some very cute kids telling us why they love books and reading, and that can only be a good thing. (Video is copyright of the Guardian and for your own personal use only.)

 

Commercial over!

Jacqueline Wilson Festival

There's a Jacqueline Wilson Festival tomorrow (Tuesday 18th) and Wednesday 19th October 2011. It’s taking place in Preston, Lancashire, organised by Askews & Holts Library Services and the University of Central Lancashire, and runs from 4pm to 6.30pm. However, you can attend online. Log in on the day, type your name into the ‘guest’ box and select ‘enter room’ to join in.

There's also a Jacqueline Wilson exhibition on at Seven Stories in Newcastle right now. If you can't make it down to Newcastle, you can see some information about it on the Seven Stories site and read a couple of first-hand accounts of the opening from Bookwitch and Lynne Rickards. There's also more on Achockablog and the BBC.

The usual plug for our own services - you can borrow all Jacqueline's books, and books about her, from us: full list here. They're a good read.

Our competition winner

Mhairi Bell and Anabel Marsh

Last month, we ran a competition to promote Scottish Book Trust's online event with David Almond. The prize was one of David's books, Clay, and the picture shows me presenting it to our winner, PGDE Primary student Mhairi Bell. Mhairi was delighted to win and, although she had not read any of David's books before, was looking forward to reading this one and using it with the children in her class when she goes on placement.

This was our first experiment with a competition like this, so now that it has been successful we might try it again - watch this space! We are indebted to Scottish Book Trust for providing the prize this time and, if you would like to catch up with the David Almond event, you can watch it on their website now.

I'm also indebted to my colleague, Lynne Marshall,  for taking the photograph.

Class writes its own book!

Picture book author Lynne Rickards had an event at the Edinburgh Book Festival this year, and afterwards she signed a copy of her book I do not eat the colour green for the P2 class at Broughton Primary. When they got back to school, the class decided to write their own book called I only eat the colour green and then they sent it to Lynne who has scanned it and put it on her blog. It's an absolutely fabulous example of a class writing project which any student of primary teaching should certainly take a look at.

We have several of Lynne's books and storysacks in our catalogue - I do not eat the colour green is available as part of The green bag.

Scottish Book Trust Young Writer's Conference 2011

Budding writers from across Scotland are being offered a rare opportunity to access the expertise and knowledge of published writers and experts from within the industry.

Scottish Book Trust’s second annual Young Writers Conference will take place on 12^th November and is open to all young people based in Scotland, aged between 14 and 17. Attendees will receive advice from some of the most exciting names in writing, including best-selling Skellig author David Almond, playwright Douglas Maxwell, teen author Gillian Philip, poet Elspeth Murray and literary agent Lindsey Fraser. If you know anyone who would like to take part, click on the link above for details and a booking form.

Books mean prizes

There are only a few days left to enter our own competition to win a book by David Almond (closing date Wednesday 28th). Here are some other competitons that your classes might be interested in:

Teen writing competition (S3-S4) on a theme of "freedom of expression".

Create a new cover for Lord of the Flies for 13-16 year olds, via The Guardian.

Anthologise: a national poetry anthology competition for secondary schools.

National Literacy Trust competition, The Comix Factor. This has sections for primary and secondary.

And did I mention our own competition? I did? Well, I'll mention it again anyway - win a book by David Almond, full details here.

Halloween!

Apologies - I know it's not even the end of September yet, but if you are going to teach about Halloween you should be looking out your resources now. Here's a list of material from our catalogue - it includes both factual books about Halloween and children's stories and picture books with a suitable theme, plus a few Media items. We've also put up a small display on the corner of the gallery between the Children's and Media collection, so please check it out.