Love, Laughter, and Life

by Laura Gehl

Unless you live in a cave (a real cave…hiding from the cold under your covers doesn’t count), you know that Kwame Alexander won the Newbery Medal on February 2nd for his book THE CROSSOVER.

On February 19th, I was lucky enough to hear Kwame speak informally in a Question & Answer session at the Children’s Book Guild of Washington, D.C.

Listening to Kwame was so inspiring that I began furiously scribbling notes, with the idea that I could share the experience with other children’s writers.

Ten things I learned (all over again!) from Kwame Alexander:

1. Kwame can’t write at home because his six-year-old daughter tries to make him dress up like a princess. So he writes at Panera instead.

My Takeaway: We all have distractions in our lives.

2. Kwame also likes to write at Panera because he can steal from those around him…a snippet of conversation…

An incredible week on posts, I was actually tempted to break this post into two parts because there were so many amazing posts out there. A huge thank you to everyone who’s written this inspirational, moving posts. They got me through a very snowy and tough week!

Suzie81 Speaks has a beautiful idea. She promotes a new blog on Mondays under the post Blog of the Day. Check out this wonderful idea here and meet a new blogger!

Hilarious and yet insightful, this post by The Story Reading Ape made me laugh. I absolutely loved it!

With her usual hilarious humour, Winter Bayne wrote this fantastic post on the Fifty Shades books. I loved it because it was not only insightful and incredibly honest but also so well written. Winter is an amazing, very talented author (check out the book covers she creates) don’t miss this awesome post!

A fantastic post on…

One of the most distressing characteristics of education reformers is that they are hyper-focused on how students perform, but they ignore how students learn. Nowhere is this misplaced emphasis more apparent, and more damaging, than in kindergarten.

A new University of Virginia study found that kindergarten changed in disturbing ways from 1999-2006. There was a marked decline in exposure to social studies, science, music, art and physical education and an increased emphasis on reading instruction. Teachers reported spending as much time on reading as all other subjects combined.

The time spent in child-selected activity dropped by more than one-third. Direct instruction and testing increased. Moreover, more teachers reported holding all children to the same standard.

How can teachers hold all children to the same standards when they are not all the same? They learn differently, mature at different stages – they just are not all the same especially at the…

An eclectic list of 99 things that children like was given to me by a writing friend last year after she attended a conference.  The list was courtesy of children’s sports author Andy Gutelle…and here I’ve added 400+ more (and more)!  I hope this list gives a spark to your writing for children, but I wonder what it will do to my search engine hits?!

If you like this page, follow its visual companion on Pinterest:
http://pinterest.com/taralazar/things-kids-like/

Note: this list is more targeted toward picture-book-age children (8 and under) than tweens (9-12) or teens.

(And also check out the list of things kids don’t like.)

1. 3D Movies
2. Acrobats
3. Air Hockey
4. Airplanes
5. Aliens
6. Allowance
7. Amusement Parks
8. Aquariums
9. Arts & Crafts
10. Astronauts
11. Autumn Leaves
12. Awards
13. Babies
14. Backpacks
15. Bacon
16. Badminton
17. Baggy Clothes
18. Balloon Animals
19. Balloons
20. Band-Aids
21. Basketball
22. Bathroom Humor
23. BB Guns
24. Beaches
25. Beanbag Chairs
26. Being Independent
27. Being Older Than Another Kid
28. Being Loved

by David Michael Slater

Greetings!

My name is David Michael Slater. As an author of 20+ books (for children, teens, and adults) I am always interested in new ways of reaching readers. Self-publishing has never appealed to me. I have nothing whatsoever against it, but the sky-high pile of self-published titles one must compete with is simply too daunting, especially when so many people report not wanting to take the time to sift through that pile for the gems. The traditional route is as daunting as ever, but I do not bash it either. But it is a rough go, especially with a project that seems risky in any way.

Enter Inkshares.

My newest picture book, Hanukkah Howie vs. Santa Claus, recently launched with this newfangled “crowd-directed” publisher. Inkshares makes final decisions about projects based on pre-sales. This is a fascinating new approach that, thus far, I find extremely reasonable.

Why?