Barbara Throws a Wobbler

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Picture books that can bring tears to the eyes even after repeated reads are few and far between. John Burningham mastered the skill with Granpa, as did Julia Donaldson and Rebecca Cobb with The Paper Dolls. But it’s particularly impressive that debut author Lauren Ace and illustrator Jenny Løvlie achieved the feat while fresh to the game with The Girls, about four schoolgirls whose friendship and lives blossom under an old apple tree. The tale won the illustrated book category of the 2019 Waterstones children’s book prize, and the pair have since received messages from readers worldwide thanking them for reflecting their own friendships and inspiring the next generation. Elle McNicholl is an important writer. Her events are both fun and powerful and she shares her experience of being autistic wisely and inspiringly. Her books are superb and should be in every home and school library. In Show Us Who You Are the main character is Cora, who is autistic. She gets involved in the dubious futuristic Pomegranate Institute, and is confronted by momentous ethical questions: – what is perfection? Are all humans valued equally? The passionate conclusion affirms the right of everyone to Sona’s family are expecting a new baby and her feelings are all mixed up. It helps to talk to a best friend, her toy Elephant. As Sona takes part in the naming ceremony, choosing one of her baby sister’s new names, things start to fall into place. A warm, gentle book which helps explore the universal experience of first-born children, with fascinating insights into life and cultural traditions in India. Available in both Welsh and English this superb short novel is set in a dystopian world where The End came in 2018. The electricity went off and the ‘normal’ 21c world disappeared. 14 year old Dylan is surviving, isolated, with his mam above Nebo village in north-west Wales. His emotions are wonderfully, sparsely drawn and we really care about him and his tiny family. A great springboard for discussion of powerful emotions, and the connections between us that make life worth living, whatever.

Nadia now writes and draws full time, and dedicates her spare moments to tweeting about pop music and championing diversity and tolerance, values that are powerfully depicted in all her books. In 2017, she collaborated with Book Trust to promote their Time To Read campaign, sending 700,000 copies of The Bumblebear to school children all across the UK. Nadia joined forces with Book Trust once more, as their official Writer and Illustrator In Residence for 2018. In addition, Nadia is an official friend of the Ministry of Stories, and supports the Penguin’s Write Now initiative for discovering under-represented voices. She lives in London with her son. Billy and the Beast was recently shortlisted for the inaugural Booktrust Story Time Prize. The books are a brilliant resource to use as part of Empathy Day on 9 June, and any time afterwards too. This year’s Empathy Day theme is empathy, our human superpower and to help everyone build that power there’s a special challenge with nine very practical, creative activities. You can do these at any time, and on 9 June watch an amazing array of authors and illustrators model the same activities, as part of Empathy Day Live! You could also retell the story from the point of view of one of Barbara’s friends. How did they feel when they saw that Barbara was upset? Armistice Day: A Collection of Remembrance - Spark Interest and Educate Children about Historical MomentsThankfully Nadia Shireen isn’t giving us a ‘fix’ for wobblers, she is giving children a way to manage them when they appear - poor Barbara looks like she has a few more lurking wobblers to deal with going forward, just like every little Barbara out there.

The judging criteria call for the selection to be from a “wide and inclusive range” of publishers and for books which “recognise a broad range of perspectives, experiences and voices” and this range is certainly demonstrated in all four categories. It is notable that once again it is small publishers such as Andersen Press, Flying Eye, Knights Of, Guppy Books, Pushkin, Faber and Thames & Hudson who dominate the lists. Rewrite the story (or part of it) in the form or a play script. Could you perform this to an audience?

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A perfect empathy-building book, with a joyful ending which brings a lump to the throat. A totally silent little boy is nurtured by empathetic teacher Miss Flotsam who builds his confidence to realise his voice is beautiful, until he finally uses it, very movingly. Every child deserves the chance to have an empathetic adult in their lives, and Miss Flotsam shows how powerfully transformative this can be. Why does the story end with a question? What does it make you think? Could you use this technique in your own stories? Like many little people, Barbara doesn't really know what a wobbler is, why it’s looming or how to control it.

Empathy for earth and all its creatures feels especially important right now. The judges chose Linda Newbery’s powerful non-fiction book to help build understanding and action – as she says “it’s not difficult to realise animals have feelings”.

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There are two large illustrations of the park in the book. In one of them Barbara is sad and in the other she is happy. Can you create two pictures of the same location showing a character’s different emotions and how it affects what they are doing? A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature. One of the criteria the judges use in choosing books for the collection focuses on titles which can help combat tribal thinking, and prejudice. Front Desk brings new perspectives on racism and injustice, and is an inspiring and very accessible read. The main character is Mia whose hard-pressed immigrant family are running a motel for a greedy, discriminatory owner – she ends up on the front desk. Her parents’ compassion and sense of community leads them to hiding other immigrants in empty rooms…and everything starts to go wrong until Mia cuts through to a solution. Another activist character, determined to make the world a better place. Research some phrases / idioms to describe emotions (e.g. on top of the world, hopping mad, feeling blue). The author / illustration has drawn their own interpretation of what a ‘wobbler’ might look like. Can you create pictures of what you think it looks like?