Children’s Book festival, this weekend at the State Library of Victoria

Click the link to find out more and to download the festival program.  Take the kids if you can!

Childrens Book Festival 2014 – The Wheeler Centre: Books, Writing, Ideas.

Also, check out this article, In Praise of Children’s Books, by Judith Ridge: where she reflects on the characters who nurtured her childhood love of reading – and passionately argues that we need to recognise, reward and nurture great children’s writing, as separate from great writing for young adults.

http://wheelercentre.com/dailies/post/ef6f14477ddd/

Reading Australia launched with new resources for teachers

The Copyright Agency Limited has just launched the Reading Australia website which aims to offer teachers  resources to support the teaching of great Aussie books, matched to the Australian Curriculum.  The books are selected for both primary and secondary schools and the resources, commissioned from PETA (the Primary English Teaching Association) are free.

I’m not very excited about their choices so far, but they are seeking feedback and suggestions – so now’s the time to get in touch with them and tell them about the beaut books they could be featuring.

Click the link below.

via Reading Australia > Home.

Southern states top NAPLAN results – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Hmm, I’m not at all sure that this actually means anything at all, but for what it’s worth, click the link.

(At least Peter Garrett had the grace to offer congratulations.  More than any other politician has ever done.)

Southern states top NAPLAN results – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).

CBCA Book of the Year 2011 shortlists announced · Readings.com.au

CBCA Book of the Year 2011 shortlists announced · Readings.com.au

via CBCA Book of the Year 2011 shortlists announced · Readings.com.au.

Winners of the CBCA book awards for 2010 · Readings.com.au

Thanks to Readings for news about this year’s awards.  Click the link below:

 Winners of the CBCA book awards for 2010 · Readings.com.au.

Children’s Books and how to choose them

Serendipity works in amazing ways.  Last night I discovered via Twitter that Dublin has been designated a UNESCO City of Literature, just as Melbourne is.  I blogged about my excitement about this on my ANZ LitLovers blog because I am travelling to Dublin later this year when I’m on Long Service Leave. 

This morning a reader of my blog from Dublin shared a link to the Children’s Books Ireland presence on Facebook, an initiative designed to promote books and reading to children.  And there I found a terrific series about how to choose children’s books, of interest not only to children’s librarians but to parents as well.

Here are the links:

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 1 – Introduction

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 2 – Subjective Appeal

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 3 – Themes

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 4 – Illustrations

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 5 – Stories

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 6 – Humor

Children’s Books: How to Choose Them, Part 7 – Developmental Value

You can subscribe to Aaron Mead’s blog by RSS if you want to follow up with further articles.  Please note that Children’s Books and Reviews is an American online bookstore.  LisaHillSchoolStuff does not endorse their products nor their association with Amazon; LisaHillSchoolStuff supports Australian books and writing and recommends independent bookshops such as Readings and Boomerang Books.  

Enid Blyton for the 21st century? Why would you bother?

The SMH has an article –  Mercy me! Blyton gets an update – about Hodder & Stoughton updating the language in Enid Blyton’s books to make them more palatable to contemporary children.

But why would you bother?   Nostalgic adults, who ‘read the Blyton books and loved them’ in the 1950s when there wasn’t much else for children to read, are perpetuating the market, but from what I see in the school library, kids would much rather read Australian children’s fiction and contemporary authors – they like a bit of modern techonology in their adventure and mystery stories.  In other words, they are just like adults who (apart from a minority who like the classics) are mostly not the least little bit interested in books from the past, especially not ones set in British boarding schools which have no relevance to Australian school life.  (Even the Harry Potter books are starting to gather dust, now that the fuss has died down).  

Our students like Tashi, Zac Power and the Keys to Rondo series.  They like Deltora Quest, the Dragonkeeper series, the Saddle Club and If You’re Reading this, It’s Too Late.

Grandparents, I suppose, will go on buying the Blytons, and kids will dutifully read them, but really most of them would be much happier reading contemporary fiction…

National Year of Reading 2012

National Year of Reading 2012

This interesting initiative is still being organised, but this is the website to watch…

via National Year of Reading 2012.

Vale Patricia Wrightson

Acclaimed children’s author Patricia Wrightson died this week, aged 88.  

The author of the much-loved Nargun and the Stars, An Older Kind of Magic, I Own the Racecourse and many other wonderful books won the CBCA Award four times, as well as the Dromkeen Medal and the Hans Christian Andersen Award for the writing.

Her death is a loss to all lovers of Australian children’s literature.  There is a tribute to her writing here and Matilda has links to others.

Victorian Students Top of the Class again!

This time last year I blogged about Victoria’s excellent results in the annual NAPLAN – and expressed my disappointment that the Minister for Education, Bronwyn Pike, had in her press release failed to congratulate Victoria’s teachers…

This year our results are again excellent – and this time, there’s credit where credit’s due:

The results are also a tribute to the dedication of our highly motivated principals and teachers,” Education Minister Bronwyn Pike said *.

That’s much better! Thanks!

*Source: http://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/news/newsalerts/2009/naplanresults09.htm and http://www.premier.vic.gov.au/minister-for-education/victorian-students-top-of-the-class-in-national-test.html