Engaging reads for children, from Books go Walkabout

Month: June 2023

A Hero Like Me by Angela Joy and Jen Reid, illustrated by Leire Salaberria

Empower children to stand up for what is right with this picture book inspired by the real-life events around the statue of a slave trader, its toppling and heroic replacement.
 
They call him ‘HERO’, but he’s no HERO – not to me.

This inspiring picture book of events through the eyes of a young girl; called Jen, who, every day, on her way to school, sees a towering statue. A statue of a man who sold freedom for cotton and tea. The world around her says this man is a hero. But she knows he’s not a hero – not a real one.

Heroes are hard to find. The girl looks for them around corners, under rocks, and on TV, but there are none that she can see. And so, she marches and shouts for them instead. And that statue – he doesn’t belong. He doesn’t stand for Kindness. He doesn’t stand for Peace. Maybe he shouldn’t stand at all.

 
A Hero Like Me is inspired by the events of 7 June 2020, when a statue of seventeenth-century slave trader Edward Colston was pulled down and thrown into Bristol Harbour during an anti-racism protest. Co-author Jen Reid was one of the protesters that day, and despite being afraid of heights, she spontaneously climbed onto the empty plinth and raised her fist high above her head – a moment that was captured on camera and shared around the world.
 
On the morning of 15 July, a statue of Jen by Marc Quinn was added to the empty plinth. It was called A Surge of Power and it gained national attention for the 24 hours it was in place, and beyond. 

A Hero Like Me empowers children to have courage to stand up for what is right and be their own hero. It shows every child that they have a voice in their community and a say in who is on their streets. That they too have power, just like Jen.

Another brilliant ‘fact finder picture book’ from publishers Frances Lincoln, part of Quarto Knows.

Sue Martin – Children’s Literacy Specialist

Sea Change, Save the Ocean edited by Tobias Hickey, published by Otter- Barry Books

What a captivating book!

The foreword from Ambassador Peter Thomson, United Nations Secretary General’s Special Envoy for the Ocean describes how, ‘we cannot have a healthy planet without a healthy ocean’.

This is a ‘red alert’ for humanity. Where better to start than with children who already know the dangers we are facing, and are prepared to start actions to save our world for future generations

Otter-Barry have published this unique book with a collection of original postcards and messages from 50 illustrators across the world, working to celebrate and protect the precious life in our oceans. This is an amazing collection and will provide schools with a catalogue of illustrators to follow.



Each illustrator has provided an image of sea creatures, fishes or other sea life, with a message of inspiration to help point out the massive and imminent dangers climate change, pollution, over fishing and other human-led interventions are having on our oceans. The postcards are displayed under three headings: Celebrating the Ocean; The Danger to the Ocean; Take Action for the Ocean.

The world-class illustrators include Axel Scheffler, Roger Mello, Isol, Barroux, Piet Grobler, Yuval Zommer, Petr Horáček, Jackie Morris, Nicola Davies, PJ Lynch and Jane Ray.

The countries represented include Argentina, Austria, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Estonia, France, Germany, Ghana, Iran, Ireland, Israel, India, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Norway, Russia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, Syria, Turkey, UK, USA.

Otter Barry are the publishers and Sea Change is a beautiful books with enormous potential for changing lives and attitudes for young people and adults too.

 This book is staying on my sofa table! But its effect will go far.

Sue Martin – Children’s Literacy Specialist

English Association Winners of 2023 English 4-11 Picture Book Awards

The English Association is proud to present the winners of the 2023 English 4-11 Picture Book Awards.

Established in 1995, the awards are presented by the English Association to the best children’s picture books of the year.  Awards are given to Fiction and Non-Fiction in age ranges 4-7 years and 7-11 years.

The winning books are chosen by the editorial board of English 4-11, the journal for primary teachers published by The English Association and the United Kingdom Literacy Association, from a shortlist selected by a panel of teachers and Primary specialists.

Each year, one of the books submitted to the English 4-11 Picture Book Awards is selected as the recipient of the Margaret Mallett Award for Children’s Non-Fiction. The winners in each category, plus the winner of this year’s Margaret Mallett Award for Children’s Non-Fiction, were announced at the online Awards Ceremony on Thursday 25 May 2023.

The award for 2023 was won by Narwhal: The Arctic Unicorn by Justin Anderson and Jo Weaver (Walker Books).

The Chair of the judging panel, Dr Sally Wilkinson, commented that…

It is a pleasure to honour prolific and well-loved children’s non-fiction authors like Nicola Davies, Anita Ganeri, and Justin Anderson, who have won many awards for their writing, film, and television work, all in celebration of our amazing natural world. These authors have worked in partnership with illustrators Abbie Cameron, Jianan Liu, and Jo Weaver to create rich, engaging texts for us to dive in to. Our fiction winners, Mariajo Illustrajo and Levi Pinfold, represent new, emerging talent and established, award-winning author-illustrators, both with lyrical, detailed works to share with us. We’re thrilled to announce this year’s winners, and look forward to seeing what next year’s competition brings!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the publishers, authors, and illustrators who sent in books to the Awards.  

A very exciting short list of books for these categories of children’s books from The English Association.

Sue Martin – Children’s Literacy Specialist

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