Looking for children’s books with strong, brave and independent female characters to inspire your children? We’ve hand-picked our top ten characters to celebrate International Women’s Day. 1) Winnie the Witch , 2+ Written by Valerie Thomas, illustrated by Korky Paul Winnie has been inspiring children around the world since her first adventure was published over thirty years ago. […]
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SHARED PRACTICE Highlighting the benefits of preparation, planning, and taking a little time to stop and evaluate – Joy Court talks to Alison Tarrant. In synergy with my latest Hot Topic (I’m a School Librarian, and I’m worth it!), I persuaded 2016 Honour List librarian Alison Tarrant (read her citation here ) from Cambourne Village College […]
Read moreHOT TOPIC I am a School Librarian, and I’m worth it! Joy Court on the merits of taking time to reflect on the great work that you do and advice on how to review the opportunities in your career. “Now that the school year is in full flow, and the flush of inductions and introductions are over, it’s […]
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A petition has recently been published on Change.org about the number of nature words in the Oxford Junior Dictionary. We take customer feedback very seriously and have addressed the most commonly raised concerns below. Like you, we feel strongly that nature is essential to children’s lives and are encouraged to see that this is such […]
Read moreWith Halloween coming up, we thought we would treat you to a spooky snippet from the fabulous How to Write Your Best Story Ever! by Christopher Edge, to help you create your own terrifying tales… How to write your best SCARY story! What scares you? A haunted house with creaking stairs? A ghostly apparition flitting through the forest? A vampire rising from […]
Read moreFriday 13 October marks the 30th birthday of our favourite witch Winnie and her loyal sidekick Wilbur! Over the past 30 years the Winnie and Wilbur series by Valerie Thomas and Korky Paul has sold over seven million copies in more than 10 languages. 2017 has been an absolute triumph for Winnie and Wilbur as […]
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From Agent Wonka to Big Friendly Zombies, snozsprouts to puckleberries, this year’s entrants to the BBC Radio 2 500 Words competition show how Roald Dahl’s language continues to inspire them. At the end of Roald Dahl’s much-loved tale of The BFG, the eponymous giant is inspired to take up storywriting, and generations of Dahl’s young readers have done likewise, using […]
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Written by lexicographer Roz Combley There’s nothing like the real thing I was recently lucky enough to analyse the Oxford Corpus, a 55-million-word collection of children’s writing from the BBC Radio 2’s 500 Words story competition. Any lexicographer will tell you that once you’ve worked with a corpus—a wonderfully powerful resource of real language evidence—you […]
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A zany was a Fool or a jester’s assistant, a bit like a clown.
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The word yoke is used to mean servitude.
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