• Teaching Ideas for Ellie’s Dragon by Bob Graham

    Ellie’s Dragon – Shortlisted for the 2021 CBCA Book of The Year: Early Childhood. The publishers say… No friendship is imaginary.  When Ellie is very little, she finds a newborn dragon fresh from the egg on a supermarket shelf and calls him Scratch. He is quite the sweetest thing she has ever seen! From that […]

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  • Anemone is not the Enemy by Anna McGregor

    Anemone is not the Enemy – Shortlisted for the 2021 CBCA Book of The Year: Early Childhood. This quirky and humorous picture book tells the story of a sea anemone who lives alone in a rock pool and desperately wants a friend … The story follows a series of conversations between the anemone and the […]

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  • Sing Me the Summer by Jane Godwin & Alison Lester

    CBCA 2021 Shortlist – Picture Book of the Year nominee Sing Me the Summer. is the latest from the perfect picture book pairing from Jane Godwin and Alison Lester. This beautiful story takes the reader on a journey through Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring and back to Summer again. It follows the change of seasons and […]

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  • Teaching Activities for Not cute. by Philip Bunting

    CBCA 2021 Shortlist – Picture Book of the Year nominee Not cute. is the latest book from the much-celebrated author and illustrator Philip Bunting. Not cute. is a funny story about an adorable Quokka who wishes to be described as anything but cute. He would prefer to be dangerous, scary or ferocious. Quokka encounters a […]

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  • Using Newman’s Prompts in Lower Primary

    Young children are natural problem solvers: that is how they learn. I was first introduced to Newman’s Error Analysis by a numeracy consultant many years ago and it has been the basis of my problem solving teaching ever since. Problem solving is an important way of learning, because it motivates children to connect previous knowledge […]

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  • The Power of the Picture Book

    I love picture books… like really love picture books. There is no better way to engage students and introduce key concepts in the classroom than with a quality picture book. As well as providing children with an introduction to art and story, these experiences are also rich in their support of early literacy. Reading picture […]

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