Hi guys. I hope you’re well.
It’s been a while since I’ve blogged here, but because so many people scattered themselves across a multitude of social platforms last year, I decided to relaunch this news blog. At the start of each month I will post any news I have on activities, competitions, events, projects and new books. This way it’s much easier for you to check for new downloadable activities, competitions and such.
From my website analytics I can see that many people are searching online for Mr Panda class activities, so that’s something I would like to address this year. At present there are two downloadable Mr Panda activities on my site. I know there are loads of Mr Panda activities available from other websites but I’d like to make more available here.
Speaking of Mr Panda, this year he is 10 years old, which means that many of the children who read Please Mr Panda in 2015 are now teenagers.
And today Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library that Please Mr Panda has been included in their 2025 program. This means that children up and down Australia will receive a copy. This is the third time that the charity has chosen one of my books. Dolly’s charity has given a mind-blowing number of books away to children. In the UK alone they have mailed six million books to children. Incredible.
For those of you familiar with my website you have noticed a few updates. More activities including some of The Queen’s Hat activities that were taken down, like the colour-blind activity. And many of the pages have been updated with more info.
Regarding book tours, I plan on doing two UK tours this year. The first one will be for schools who can’t afford Author visits and the second will be in June. I’ll provide more details in my next blog post, at the start of February.
I am going to Portugal in February to present a plenary at the APPInep (Portuguese English Teachers Association) Seminar in Leiria which I’m looking forward to. But at the moment I don’t have any other overseas plans, except for attending the Bologna Children’s Book Fair.
I think that’s it for now.
Tomorrow is the award-giving ceremony at Swindon Central Library for last year’s creative local competition - Make A Marvellous Monster. I received over 500 entries, so choosing 14 winners (one for each library) wasn’t a quick process. All the entries are on display in the library and have been for the past few months. I’m going to meet Outreach Librarian Debbie tomorrow morning to help set things up for the event.
And today I am working on the 9th Mr Panda book.
Bye for now!
Steve