Category Archives: Uncategorized

Somme Centenary in Schools

This Friday – July 1st – sees the centenary anniversary of the Battle of the Somme. It will be covered live on the BBC on the day, during school time. You can read about the BBC’s schedule here.

I have been working with the National Literacy Trust and Barrington Stoke to create a range of resources for schools to use to help today’s children get their heads round what happened in France one hundred years ago.

I’ve done it because I have a book out about a group of footballers who fought at the Battle of the Somme, called Over the Line. But also because I think it is important for children today to know about the bloodiest battle of the First World War.

OTL-new cover

You can access the following resources via the links below:

 

Live Somme-based story

Over the last fortnight I have been writing a daily story ‘live’ on the National Literacy Trust website. It is partly about Euro 2016 and partly about the centenary of the Battle of the Somme. In its third and final week, beginning on Monday 27th June, the characters, who are year seven children, will be going on a Battlefield Tour of the Somme area with their schools, visiting war graves, battle sites and the official centenary commemoration at Thiepval. I have talked with three schools who have been on Battlefield Tours recently to try my best to get it right.

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/resources/practical_resources_info/7175_over_the_line_2016

 

Videos from major Battle of the Somme sites

After finishing Over the Line, I revisited the settings of the book to talk about how each place had impacted my writing. Those settings include the English Channel, a soldier footballer’s grave, the Footballers’ Battalion official memorial and Delville Wood. They are also settings featured in this week’s live story.

https://tompalmer.co.uk/first-world-war-literacy-resources/

 

Toolkit of School Resources

Our EURO 2016 toolkit also includes ideas for Somme related classroom displays, activities and assemblies to mark Centenary. It was published by the National Literacy Trust in May.

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/resources/practical_resources_info/7174_euro_2016_and_battle_of_the_somme_literacy_toolkit

 

Other free resources relating to Over the Line

You can access free posters relating to the book here, as well as a discussion guide to the main themes and short classroom play scripts drawn from the novel. You can find all these resources via https://tompalmer.co.uk/first-world-war-literacy-resources.

 

I hope these resources are useful. Thanks for reading.

Ideas for the staffroom during the Rugby World Cup

This is the first of several blogs about how you can use the buzz around the Rugby World Cup to encourage reading for pleasure in your school.

If you want reading for pleasure campaigns to work in your school or library, you need all, or at least some, of your colleagues on board. And that starts in the staffroom.

 

Staff rugby reading training

In the lead up to the Rugby World Cup use one of the school’s staff meetings as a chance to train or inform your colleagues in the joys of rugby reading.

Take three ideas from the Read Rugby toolkit (see link below). Ones that will work well in with your pupils. Ask your colleagues to help you tailor those ideas for the children in your school. As well as helping you to make the ideas work best for you, it may also bring some of them on board with delivering the ideas.

Then talk about what else you can do, using the toolkit.

 

Staff rugby readers

Ask your colleagues if they would like to join you as rugby reading champions. Are some of them rugby fans? Or general sports fans? Can they be persuaded?

They could be encouraged to look out for reluctant readers in school and talk to them about rugby – or other – reading, help you run rugby reading book groups, talk to parents about your plans in the playground.

Ask them to generate their own ideas – or to choose some from the toolkit.

 

Staffroom poster

Create a poster for the staffroom, reminding your colleagues of your rugby reading activities.

 

Staff reading selfies

Kids love to know what their teachers are reading. Ask all your colleagues to do a rugby reading selfie for your school display areas. Ideally rugby books, magazines or newspapers. But – if they are not into rugby – a selfie of them reading something that they are passionate about.

 

Reluctant reader posters

In the same way you have posters in staffrooms about children and their allergies or health issues, put up some posters of children who aren’t keen on reading, but who do like sport. Say what sports they like. Encourage your colleagues to talk to them about things they have read.

 

Rugby Readers

Employ pupils as Rugby Readers, so that they can help you champion rugby reading during 2015, allow them into the staffroom as special children during their role as champions.

 

For more free ideas and resources about using the Rugby World Cup to encourage children to read for pleasure, please visit http://englandrugbyteachersresource.com/putting-it-into-practice/other-subjects/literacy and check out the Read Rugby toolkit. It takes less than a minute to subscribe.

Many thanks.

15 Rugby Reads for Kids

February and March are going to be marvellous months for rugby fans. They can also be a fantastic few weeks for rugby readers.

I’ve selected 15 different things that kids – and adults – can read about rugby to enhance their experience of the Six Nations internationals – and beyond.

1   Non-fiction books full of facts and potted history. Easy to read. Available in library as well as bookshops. In the sport section.

2   The internet. There are some excellent rugby websites out there, including all the newspapers, Sky, the BBC and more.

3   Official Magazine of the Six Nations. Available in the newsagents now.

4   Newspapers. Either on paper or online. Previews. match reports. Interviews. Speculation. Usually written by passionate rugby journalists who really care.

5   A variety of children’s fiction by authors Gerard Siggins. Chris Higgins, Tom Palmer, Dan Anthony and Andrew Smith. Again, in bookshops and libraries.

6   England Rugby magazine. The magazine is only available to online England Supporters’ Club members. But it’s good. It includes exclusive embedded videos and audio.

7   Biographies and autobiographies of rugby players. Past and present.

8   The ultimate rugby book is the IRB’s yearbook, full of stats and information about the last 12 months.

9   Match day programmes from international and domestic matches.

10   The England Rugby Annual, full of interviews and quizzes and other treats for kids. And some adults.

11   Rugby World. The best selling rugby magazine in the world. Monthly glossy. Available in white, red, blue and green. Well written.

12   Calon by Owen Sheers. Fantastic book about rugby union in Wales. Universal too.

13   Combat Zone. The first book in the new Rugby Academy series by Tom Palmer (me).  All available separtately or as a combined trilogy.

14   How to play rugby books. Several levels, starting with this Know the Game book.

15   The Rugby Paper. Weekly newspaper, out on Sundays. £1.50. Match reports, politics, lots of talk about the international game. Excellent.

With just months to go up to the Rugby World Cup there is a lot to read about the game of rugby. That’s good news. No doubt there’ll be much more coming our way soon, with the tournament being hosted by England – and with games taking place in Wales too.

Happy reading, everyone.  And…

To find out more about my Rugby Academy series, have a look here. Please.

Buy Books

Signed and dedicated copies of all my books are available personalised to order from my local independent children’s bookshop “The Thoughtful Spot” here. 

With an extra special Christmas or birthday card from me on request!

Overseas :
Australia: Boomerang

Canada: Amazon Canada
New Zealand: Wheelers

USA :  Indigo books

Visit myAmazon bookshop or support your local bookshop HIVE

 

 

Schools bumper 33 book pack
offer here

33 books
£194 saving £63 – over 25% discount
FREE DELIVERY & SIGNED BOOKPLATES

Please email rosie@rosemaryhillbooks.co.uk

 

Schools class set offer here.

15 copies 20%+ discount
30 copies 25%+ discount
100 copies 30% + discount

FREE DELIVERY & SIGNED BOOKPLATES

Please email rosie@rosemaryhillbooks.co.uk for a quote

 

Email me here for more information or use my contact form here to ask me a question.

Thank you.

 

PRIVACY & COOKIES POLICY                            TERMS & CONDITIONS

 

 

 

 

Miss, I can read this!

I had my best day as an author in Bridgend, south Wales, two years ago.

I had just delivered an event to a group of so-called reluctant readers in a sports centre.  A quiz. A talk about sports reading. Afterwards, twenty lads were letting off steam hammering a ball at a librarian who had volunteered to go in goal.

And I was talking to their teacher.

She turned a copy of my book, Scrum, over and saw the Dyslexia Friendly sticker on the back.

‘What does that mean?’ she asked.

I told her. Barrington Stoke publish books that have been designed with special font, layout and page-colour (along with editing) that helps readers overcome many of the problems that dyslexia presents.

The teacher pointed across at a boy. Rhys, she told me, was dyslexic He wanted to read. But it was very hard for him. It affected his self esteem, she said. A lot.

She called Rhys over, putting the book in his hands.

‘What’s this?’ he asked her. Then glanced at me, looking uneasy.

‘Look at it,’ she insisted.

Rhys opened the book, eyes glazed over already. But then something changed. He focused on the page in front of him. Then stared at his teacher.

‘Miss,’ he said, his mouth open, ‘I can read this.’

I’ll never forget that moment.

This week is Dyslexia Awareness Week. It runs from November 3rd to 9th. Brought to us by the British Dyslexia Association.

 

Rugby Academy 1

This is my new book. It’s called Combat Zone. It’s out this week. combat zone cover

Combat Zone is about a school rugby team that takes part in the UK schools’ championship at the same time that most of the players’ parents are involved in a conflict in the Middle East with the RAF.

There is a lot going this autumn to help Combat Zone take off. The highlights are:

* an event at Cheltenham Literature Festival this Saturday 11th October at 3 p.m. – the event is called Football v Rugby, which means I have to bring both my football and rugby posts down from Leeds.

* a launch event at the RAF Museum in Cosford on November 20th, where we will be joined by some of the RAF rugby team. The RAF is a large part of the content of the book – and they and their children helped enormously with the research. You can read about that here.

* a day of events at my Patron of Reading school in Edinburgh, Stewarts Melville.

* a pilot set of events in East Grinstead, working with two schools the public library and the local rugby club, to see if we can reach a whole community through four different venues.

* dozens of school and  library events in rugby strongholds like Leicester, Exeter and more.

In addition, I am working up five projects to do with rugby union and literacy. For the RFU . To be delivered in 2015, Rugby World Cup year. There’s more about that on a previous blog, here.

Thanks for reading.

Working with the RAF

Over the last two years I have been working closely with the RAF Museum in Cosford and the primary school at nearby Albrighton. It has been invaluable to me as a writer.

Over the next twelve months my Rugby Academy series will be published by Barrington Stoke. (Find out more here.) These books feature children with parents involved in a dangerous RAF humanitarian relief effort. Without the help of both the museum and the school, I would not have been able to write the series.

But there is more.

I visited RAF Cosford today to talk about how we can work together to promote reading for pleasure. The museum has dozens of astonishing artefacts that would stimulate most children. Spitfires. The recently recovered Dornier. A soon-to-be launched exhibition of fragile WW1 planes.

And behind those artefacts there are stories. Each plane – be it from WW1, WW2, the Cold War or between and after – has a wealth of stories that we can engage both boys and girls with. I can attest to this having visited the museum with school children and my ten-year-old daughter.

In fact, it was making an Airfix model with my daughter that inspired my future series of books, due out in 2016.

I am thrilled to announce today that Barrington Stoke will be publishing three books in that series called Wings.

The books will blend the excitement of making model aeroplanes and seeing the real thing at RAF Cosford with the true stories of adventure, sadness, fear and courage that many of the planes in their collection inspire.

I’ll have much more to say about both new series of books and my relationship with RAF Cosford over the next few months.

Thank you for reading.

Tour de Leeds Libraries

Tour de Leeds Libraries

During the next two weeks I will be visiting all of Leeds’ thirty-six public libraries. By bike.

I am doing it because cycling is the big thing for kids in Leeds at the moment: the Tour de France starts in the city on July 5th and everyone is getting pretty excited about it.

Also, because I want the next big thing for kids to be libraries.

I’ll have half an hour in each library – four a day – to talk to a class of year three and four children, visiting from a local school. I’ll ask them if they use libraries and tell them about how Leeds Libraries changed my life. I am also going to read them a story I have written for the tour. About a girl who goes on a different adventure each time she borrows a library book. Which is kind of what libraries do.

There’s a full schedule of my tour on my website. It’s about 250 miles in all. The worst/best day is 40 miles. I’m a bit worried about that one, to be honest. I’m not a great cyclist. But I’ve done a bit of training. I should be okay.

The highlights – for me – will be Leeds Central Library and Oakwood Library. The places where libraries worked their magic. It’ll feel good returning to those. I wouldn’t be an author if it wasn’t for Leeds Libraries.

More importantly, I wouldn’t be a reader. I love reading. It makes me think. It makes me happy. It gives me something I can’t even put into words. I want to get that across. Somehow.

Tour de Leeds Libraries was organised with Leeds Schools Library Service and Leeds Libraries. It is funded by Leeds Inspired. There is a free resource of literacy activities to do with the Tour de France that libraries, schools and families across the UK might find useful.

I’ll be tweeting as I go, using the hashtag #TourDeLeedsLibraries.