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The Christchurch Kids Blog is our latest literacy initiative at Christchurch City Libraries, aimed at promoting books and reading to children. The Christchurch Kids blog is by, for and about children living in New Zealand – especially eight- to twelveyear- olds living in Christchurch and Canterbury. Children can find information on things that interest them, from music and movies to friends and school, books and reading.

Our aim is to get children in Christchurch and Canterbury discussing the books they read and the movies they watch and interacting with authors. Children are able to comment on blog posts, giving their views and opinions and they are also able to create their own content, based on things that interest them. When we first established the blog, we gave children who were interested the chance to become Star Bloggers. These children were regular bloggers who we would meet with once a fortnight to talk about books and give them a chance to write blog posts with staff help. We also approached schools to offer a one-off blogging session for their Year 5–8 classes. Several Canterbury primary and intermediate schools have taken this opportunity, which has resulted in an increase in the number of children using the blog.

Christchurch City Libraries staff use the Kids Blog to highlight areas of the library collection, including non-fiction, fiction, reference materials, audiovisual and our increasing range of web resources. We have a strong focus on local authors and illustrators, and offer them the chance to write for the blog, either as a Star Author or by writing a guest post. We also highlight events in the library and throughout the region, such as author visits, the Storylines Free Family Day, New Zealand Music Month, Kidsfest and other holiday programmes.

The most exciting feature of the blog is our monthly Star Author promotion. Each month we feature a Star Author, who blogs about their books, offers writing tips and answers readers’ questions. So far, we have had Brian Falkner, Des Hunt, Sharon Holt, Kyle Mewburn and several Australian authors participating in the programme. The content created by these authors is of huge value to schools throughout the country – children can discover what it is like to be an author and how authors create their characters and stories, and can connect to these stories through their interaction with authors.

Come and check out the Christchurch Kids Blog and promote it to your students. It’s a great opportunity for them to talk about books and reading and get some recommendations on what to read next.

Zac Harding is the Children’s Library Assistant at Christchurch City Libraries.

A large number of young adult novels with a dystopian theme and a lack of non-fiction books were two interesting trends that have emerged from the New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards this year. While the picture book and junior fiction categories were as strong as ever, just 10 books were submitted in the non-fiction category – compared with 26 the year before – and we wondered if the internet had killed non-fiction.

The internet is an attractive and instant source of information, but its sheer size and unbridled data stream make it difficult for children to decipher what is relevant, what is important and even what is true. A good non-fiction writer should be able to sieve through the dross and present verified and accurate information in an appropriate format for the intended age group.

It would appear that non-fiction books are a casualty of these straitened times. New Zealand publishers have downsized their children’s schedules in the last two or three years so, combined with the demise of Reed Publishing, there is a big gap in the non-fiction area.

Dystopian themes in young adult novels have become a dominant trend internationally, and four of the five finalists in this category for the book awards this year were set in post-apocalyptic worlds ruled by tyrants. Interestingly, all were parts of trilogies – a publishing format that is prospering worldwide. And it looks as though novels reflecting societies changed by natural and manmade disasters or war will continue to be published here, with at least six due by the end of this year.

The junior fiction field has always been slanted toward the older end of the category, so it is pleasing to see the publication of more junior novels that particularly suit the emerging reader. These fit neatly between picture books and chapter books. Finnigan and the Pirates by Sherryl Jordan, which won the 2011 New Zealand Post Junior Fiction Award, is a classic example with its colour illustrations, short chapters, well-spaced text and excellent production standards.

There is one genre that has hardly ever been published in New Zealand children’s literature and that is the sports story. In our judges’ report, we have asked where the sports stories are, especially when New Zealand has hosted, and won, the Rugby World Cup this year. We find it hard to believe that in this sports-mad country there are no indigenous sports books for children. We believe there is room for a good fiction series about a plucky young rugby team for ages eight to twelve, with lots of rugby detail and statistics. In the last couple of months there have been a number of rugby books published for children, but they are mainly commercially ‘licensed’ activity books that include stickers, facts and figures and posters and are designed more for marketing the game and its sponsors than engaging children in reading.

It would be good to see sports books become the next trend, but hopefully they’re genuine sports story rather than activity books!

The New Zealand Book Council author visit programme Writers in Schools began in 1973, and now delivers visits to over 250 schools each year, reaching as many as 50,000 children. Originally modeled on a similar programme delivered in Hawai’i, Writers in Schools has seen the famous feet of people like Joy Cowley, Margaret Mahy, Sam Hunt and Gary McCormick tread the hallowed halls of schools around the country.

The experience of having a famous author visit their school provided many authors who have just begun to make a name for themselves in the world of children’s books early inspiration. Melanie Drewery cites a visit from Margaret Mahy as the point at which she realised that she may one day be able to write for a living, and there are many similar stories. But the value of a writer visit extends beyond mere ‘experience’ – it can be integrated seamlessly into your classroom plans, while meeting several key competencies.

So how do you align a visit from a guest author with your classroom plans, allowing you to tick a few boxes while enjoying what the writer has to say?

‘A visiting writer can emphasise, expand on, bed in much that a teacher will have already been saying about writing, reading, imaginative reach, ways of looking at the world...Students, being what they are, often pay closer attention to the visitor saying these things...’
(Kate De Goldi)

Literacy contracts

For the past two years, the Book Council has had a Ministry of Education contract to provide a rural and low-decile school targeted programme within Writers in Schools called the sky is the limit when you read. For the past two years, we have worked with Literacy Development Officers and the National Library School Services team to select regions on literacy development contracts to target with this programme.

Schools who benefit from this programme are asked afterward how they have worked the visit into their literacy curriculum. Some of the topics they aligned the visit with are: writing for audience, reading comprehension, reading for pleasure, author intention, author study, visit of the ‘expert’ in the reading unit, wider use of vocabulary, use of inferencing in reading, using personal voice to add detail to written work, how pictures and text work together to tell a story, valuing literacy, and looking at innovation of fairy tales.

If you have arranged a visit from a writer or illustrator, and your school is on a literacy contract, let the author know. They are able to craft their talk to suit your needs, whether you want somebody to tell stories to the year ones and twos and help them to understand how illustrations work with words in picture books, or to talk in depth about how to read a book in context of the students’ own knowledge.

Tracy’s visit brought to life the full meaning of how pictures and text can work together to tell a story. (Te Wharau School, Gisborne, visited by Tracy Duncan)

A case study
Kate De Goldi visited Northland for two weeks in May, and during this time led extended creative writing workshops with both students and teachers from 13 schools. The Ministry literacy contract active in Northland at the time was about vocabulary extension, which provided an ideal focus for this tour. This tour exemplifies how successful writer visits can be when there is full buy-in from schools, in this case ensured by the dedicated Far North National Library School Services advisor, Jeannie Skinner.

I estimate that she spoke to hundreds of teachers and students over the course of her visit, and her impact is still felt when people reflect on things she said, talk about books she recommended, and discuss strategies that they have implemented at her suggestion.
(Jeannie Skinner, Library Advisor, School Services, National Library of New Zealand)

A key result of Kate’s visits was an overall enhancement of schools’ writing programmes. Kerikeri Primary School hosted Kate for a staff meeting, which they used to have a session on ‘Writing Ideas’. Lynne Oldham says that many of Kate’s ideas have become part of the schools’ writing programme, and one of the experienced teachers who was involved in the session said ‘this has been the most useful staff meeting I’ve ever been to.’

This also applies at a secondary level, with Di Eastwood from Kaitaia College saying ‘I returned to school, wrote a unit based around what I had learned, and shared it with the rest of the department’. At the same school, there is now a GATE ‘writers group’ which is held during ‘house group’ for the talented writers who wish to continue the work Kate began with them.

I found the workshop to be a beneficial experience which has definitely given me the tools to better myself as a writer. The exercises she showed us to help develop our writing were both fun and interesting to participate in. I was surprised at the amount of ideas that surfaced from my subconscious when I took part in activities…
Marisa Oien from Kaitaia College, talking about Kate’s workshop

Each of the schools that took part in this tour were members of the Book Council, which meant they were able to have one half-day free visit from a writer of their choice. Most of these schools paid an extra $50 to allow Kate to provide them with writing workshops, but as shown in the previous section, this is not the only way to get value from a writer visit.

Subject and key competency links
Because writing and reading are core competencies that apply to every subject, author visits can be linked throughout the curriculum. Where subjects are delineated, especially in high schools, our non-fiction writers could be used in Science classes to talk about observation methods and technical writing, in Social Studies classes to talk about creating stories from research, as well as in English to talk about use of Language in creative writing, or reading comprehension.

Although writers are not teachers, their visits can be used to enhance key competencies more generally, helping children think about the world differently, relate to others more fulsomely, and of course to learn new language skills.
 

They’re a kind of walking example of literacy taken to its apotheosis: literature.
(Kate De Goldi)
 

For more information about how to join the Book Council and participate in Writers in Schools, go to the ‘schools’ part of the Education section. Membership is only $82, and includes benefits such as the publication Booknotes, the review publication The School Library, and better access to a range of poster and DVD resources.

New Zealand company Kiwa Media is set to launch interactive, touch-enabled educational content for the iPad. Kiwa Media will be working in partnership with educational publishers to create relevant content to support teachers in schools across the globe. Kiwa Media recognises the benefits of working with educational publishers to provide high-quality digital content with robust pedagogy on devices such as the iPad.

‘Working in partnership with educational publishers is central to our strategy,’ says Roger Shakes, Kiwa Media’s Vice President Business Development. ‘We’re looking for publishers who have a reputation for publishing high-quality educational material. We’re taking our knowledge, expertise and experience in developing technology suitable for the classroom. The mechanism for delivering content is changing, but the pedagogy remains intact so we’re working with educational publishers to ensure we meet both objectives.’

Kiwa Media is already enjoying success in digital publishing with its innovative QBook product. QBook is an interactive, read-along digital storybook for children on Apple’s iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch devices. Kiwa Media has agreements in place with a number of publishers, including Penguin New Zealand, and the move into educational publishing is a natural expansion of the company’s capabilities.

‘We’ve seen tremendous interest in QBook and our Content Universal Tool for creating interactive digital content,’ says Luke Tomes, Kiwa’s Vice President Technology. ‘We have a fantastic opportunity to produce educational materials that use all the features and functions of devices like the iPad. We’ll be developing digital content for 21st-century classrooms. We want to encourage best practice for teachers using technology in the classroom by producing content with sound pedagogy that enhances literacy development.’

In each QBook, users will discover a host of features and functions, including the ability to touch a word to hear it being spoken, and touch and hold a word to hear it being spelt. They can even record their own narration. This extensive range of features has helped to generate interest worldwide.

‘QBooks have some really fun elements within each title. There’s a Memory Pairs game and a Wordfind puzzle to keep children entertained, but the book remains at the core of everything we do,’ says Shakes. ‘We’ve also added a number of foreign languages, including Māori, Spanish and Japanese, that help drive sales overseas.’

In the first few months since their release, QBooks have been downloaded in over 40 countries, reflecting the global nature of digital books. You can try a QBook for free by downloading Penguin’s Sebastian’s Tail QBook Lite from the iTunes App Store (itunes.com/app/kiwamedia).

I would like to write about two things that have been on my mind of late. One is the continuing importance of cover design in book sales, and the other is the book industry’s current predicament over the emergence of electronic devices.

I have been selling books for several years now and it appears to me that a cover can make a great deal of difference when it comes to child readers. When adults buy a book, although a bad cover might make them wonder why the publisher made that choice, a wider range of factors affect their decision, such as recommendations on radio and television or in magazines – which are proven to have an instant influence on sales regardless of covers.

Children are a very different story. Even if parents, the media or bookshop staff recommend a book, the cover will often make the difference between children taking a look at the book, or not.

It is important that the cover gives an idea of the book’s content, but it also has to have what I can only call the ‘X factor’. There are many fine examples of this. The Swallows and Amazons or Little House on the Prairie series have timeless covers that evoke the past but continue to work well for children. Newer titles that primary level children are excited about include books by Anthony Horowitz and Justin D’ath, and the Geronimo Stilton and the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. The Zac Power series is unique as, although the content is very much for a younger reader, its cover design makes older children, too, amenable to reading it.

In the past few years New Zealand covers have improved and can match books from anywhere in the world. Overseas customers are impressed by our quality and range, especially of picture flats and teenage reads. The Kiwi Bites series has disappeared, due to poor sales. This is a shame, as there are few New Zealand books that cater for the early to independent readers, but I’m sure the lack of sales was due to the old-fashioned and unappealing cover design.

With the increase in portable reading devices coming onto the market, some ‘experts’ have said that the book industry will collapse by November 2012. I can see that there will definitely be a change in the market as we have known it. The obvious appeal of the electronic device can be seen most keenly in the requirements of adult readers, who appreciate the convenience of carrying around a small screen rather than a bulky paperback in their pocket. But when I read, the feel, smell and look of a book add to the experience and are of equal importance. Will schools and parents embrace these new devices for children’s books? Time will tell. In the meantime I maintain that a small computer screen will never allow the same connection with readers that the more traditional book format allows. The electronic device may even increase the difficulty of getting some children to read an entire book, especially those that would rather play computer games or facebook their friends.

With all the uncertainty being felt in the publishing world at the moment, I hope that publishers continue to understand the importance of cover design in book sales, so that our children will continue to choose from a wide range of high-quality books to inspire them for many years to come – whatever the medium might be.

Jan Stroud is the children’s book buyer at University Book Shop in Dunedin. With a background in design and mother to three adult children, Jan is passionate about children’s books, especially picture books.

Much of our New Zealand children’s literary heritage is being lost. At present there is no readily accessible archival collection of manuscripts and illustrations of specifically children’s literature in New Zealand.

This is where Te Tai Tamariki: Aotearoa New Zealand Children’s Literature Preservation Charitable Trust comes in. Te Tai Tamariki, meaning the tide of children, is a national centre based in Christchurch that celebrates, preserves and displays illustrations and written work from children’s literature, as well as providing dynamic exhibitions that tour throughout the country. It is modeled after centres such as Dromkeen (Australia) and the Centre for Children’s Books (UK).

For the last twelve months we have been based in gallery premises at 87 Victoria Street, and are currently fundraising in order to properly store and preserve the expanding collection. Without a facility able to store resources under temperature and humidity control to international archival standards, these treasures will continue to be lost or could deteriorate beyond saving.

One of the reasons we focus on preserving these pieces is that we would like people to appreciate that illustrations, particularly those in picture books, are art in their own right and illustrators are in fact artists. We believe they should be given the recognition and appreciation that other works of art receive, and this includes preserving them and giving people the opportunity to view them. We want to show people that a book does not miraculously appear. The material that we have (and want) is prepublication material that shows the evolution of the story and the development of the book. The collection will also reflect our social development, and in this way be valuable for research. We own the complete set of illustrations from Terrible Taniwha of Timberditch by Joy Cowley and Rodney McRae. They were generously donated by Rodney and Penguin. We also have a Lyn Kriegler original from Professor Pingwit and the Pungapeople, and draft manuscripts from David Hill.

We own about 30 illustrations and four manuscripts, plus about 1500 fiction, non-fiction and picture books that will form the backbone of a research collection, as they span several decades of children’s literature in New Zealand and accurately chart its development. The collection is young so we don’t own a lot, but we have had quite a few people express an interest in donating, now that we have premises.

Te Tai Tamariki also supports and provides a comprehensive education programme for all ages, with a special focus on the visual literacy learning outcomes of the school curriculum. At present we have works from a variety of illustrators including Gavin Bishop, Robyn Kahukiwa, Murray Grimsdale, Ruth Paul and Brian Lovelock on loan, and these are featured in the four exhibitions that we are currently hosting or touring around the country. Please check www. tetaitamariki.org.nz for the new exhibition timetables.

Mary Sangster is the secretary of Te Tai Tamariki, a board member of Booksellers New Zealand, and works at The Children’s Bookshop in Christchurch. This article was written before the Christchurch earthquake on 22 February. Te Tai Tamariki’s gallery premises were irreparably damaged. The trust is now looking for a new space. However, the collection appears safe, and they are now hoping to gain access to it. Our hearts and thoughts go out to Te Tai Tamariki, and to everyone in Christchurch.

In term four last year, I worked with a group of Year 5/6 students, and teacher Tracye Katon, from Palmerston North’s Central Normal School on a 16/18 page picture-book project. As part of the Creative Coaching writer residencies, they had to write, illustrate and design their book within seven weeks.

I helped the students kick their characters into shape, while Tracye’s experience with teaching art ensured the students used a whole variety of media – and her no-nonsense approach meant that the project actually got finished.

We began the sessions by showing the students examples of books we felt worked well, and talked about the importance of having a beginning, a middle and an end. I showed them the proofs of Piggity and the Camping Holiday, as it was nearly ready for the publishers to send to print and I was very excited about it. (This may been a mistake. They fell in love with Philip Webb’s pictures and the vast amount of information contained in them; we then had a lot of trouble at the artwork stage getting things simple enough, and thought later that we should have made a point, right at the start, of using simple shapes and backgrounds in their pictures.)

Once the students had all written an initial draft, our first step was to get them to reduce that to bullet-points so they could see the storyline easily. I encouraged them to think about changing their characters from humans to animals, which gives scope for quirky characterization and makes illustration easier. Although I advised them not to write in rhyme unless they were desperate to, most of them did. (I worried rhyme was not the elite sport I had hoped it was.)

There were quite a few problems with getting words and storyline to fit together, but it turned out to be a good way to learn that the story is paramount, and the delivery has to follow. We got around the problems with some having a little rhyming refrain, and others ditching the rhyme completely.

Tracye and I were insistent that every student would have a complete story with credible characters, and we encouraged them to make changes until they got a good result. One student started again well into the sessions, and was much happier with the result. Another changed his story from past to present tense, as he wanted more “fire” in his story. He got it.

Diana Neild is an award-winning children’s book writer and takes part in Writers in Schools. Creative Coaching writer residencies are a new extended programme, where the writer works with a school on a literacy project over several visits. To find out more about Creative Coaching writer residencies, visit www.bookcouncil.org.nz/education/programmeoverview/ our-programmes.

The 18th Storylines Festival of New Zealand Children’s Writers and Illustrators will take place in five different cities around New Zealand in August 2011. The annual Storylines Festival creates a literary whirlwind around New Zealand and provides the opportunity for thousands of children to come face-to-face with their literary heroes.
A number of events contribute to the week-long festival. These include the Heritage Hotels Seminar Series, the Auckland Story Tour, the Northland Story Tour, workshops for children and Free Family Days.

The Heritage Hotels Seminar Series is designed for adults with a particular interest in children’s literature. This year, international guest speaker Chris Morphew will talk about his work, which includes working as a ghost writer for the hugely popular Zac Power series as well as writing his own Phoenix File series. These seminars are interactive and attendees have the opportunity to ask questions of the guest speaker.

The Auckland and Northland Story Tours visit schools and early childhood centres in the week prior to their respective Family Days. The tour of popular New Zealand authors and illustrators provides children and their teachers with the opportunity to meet and listen to guest authors and illustrators in their schools and communities.
Workshops in the Auckland area (at a minimal charge) offer children aged 8–14 expert tuition from some of the country’s leading writers and illustrators. The content of each workshop is developed for a specific age range. Each author or illustrator leads a practical workshop for an hour and a half for a maximum of 20 children. The

Storylines Free Family Days in 2011 take place in Kerikeri, Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin. The event in Christchurch faces limited facilities, so has been modified to take new venues into account. These days offer a varied and exciting array of interactive activities, geared towards 4–10-year-olds. Children are encouraged to join in on bookrelated arts and crafts, listen to a story read aloud by favourite authors and illustrators, assist a Storyteller with a tale, or pose a question to an author or illustrator about their work or ideas. Performances from professional theatre companies, other performers (with some exciting details for 2011 yet to be made public) and schools groups will encourage children’s creativity and involvement with New Zealand books and stories as they come alive on stage. With so much on offer throughout the day, the hard part is deciding what to do next.

For two years my wife has given me books, for both Christmas and my birthday in early January. ‘Coals to Newcastle’ springs to mind – I am a bookseller – but she buys me ‘adult books’, which she hopes will take my head into a different space for the couple of weeks the shop is closed.

I’ve read the books, maybe six or eight each year. They are literary fiction, ‘good books’. Last year I felt vaguely dissatisfied, and when the same thing happened this year, I suddenly realised, on the last weekend of my holiday, what was missing. All the books I’d read were beautifully written, well–told stories with acutely observed characters and settings, but they evoked in me very little feeling. They were too cool, detached.

Of course there is ‘cool’ fiction for younger readers too, but mostly on the plot-is-everything side of the ledger. Yet much young adult fiction – and even younger – brings tears to my eyes. Joy, sorrow, pain or that feeling of ‘yes, that’s how that feels’. That emotional identification, the feeling of being alongside the character was part of what I loved about Harry Potter, Maurice Gee’s Salt trilogy, The Ranger’s Apprentice series, and books by Philip Pullman, Michael Morpurgo, Louis Sachar, Margaret Mahy, Fleur Beale and David Hill (to name a few). I can’t remember when an ‘adult’ novel last did that for me. My sample may be small, and perhaps I’ve been unlucky, so this is could be unfair, but I think the selection is probably enough to make an unscientific generalisation.

So: adult novel ‘cool’, young adult novel warmer. Why? Not because of gender. I read adult novels by male and female writers, and authors for younger readers are similarly split. Is it that we think emotion is not a suitable subject for adults? That statement seems a little farfetched, but is it? There’s a moment I love in Melina Marchetta’s wonderful The Piper’s Son when a character says ‘We don’t live in a society any more . . . We live in an economy. We’re not citizens. We’re customers.’

And I agree. While this may have been happening slowly over time, it is also ingrained in our development. We go to school, where we have a ready-made community. A small community, sure, but one where even the misfits and mavericks among us belong. Just look at the cheers, hugs and tears at a leavers’ assembly or graduation. Then we leave the education system and find ourselves in a dog-eat-dog world of lonely individualism. We harden our hearts and decide emotion is unnecessary baggage.

If your heart seems mislaid or sluggish in this hard, competitive world, read a children’s book or young adult fiction. Oliver Jeffers’ fabulous picture book The Heart and the Bottle tells us how to heal our hearts after they’ve been put away, lost, broken. Children’s books are a defibrillator, shocking the heart back into rhythm, and for those people who shut themselves away with pens and keyboards to create these books, I’m incredibly grateful.

Malcolm McEwen spends some of his life in Story Time Books for Kids, a specialist children’s bookshop in Petone, but in the rest of his life he’s a determined non-specialist who doesn’t have a TV and thinks conversation is one of life’s most underrated pleasures. He also thinks that children teach adults how to be human much more often than the other way around.