I hope you, your pupils, colleagues and family are all well and that the partial transitions from lockdown back to school  are going ok for you all.

I’ve had a few requests for welcome back messages to share with  classroom bubbles and or something to add to an author wall.

So I’ve drafted a brief message here which may be of help in your classroom.   You can download it here .

I am also available for virtual visits more here.

And there are more posters to download here.

Or email me here if you need something more specific to support your school or fill in my contact form below with your school name and address for free poster pack with signed personalised materials.

[contact-form to=”admin@tompalmer.co.uk” subject=”Poster pack request via Tom Palmer’s website”][contact-field label=”Name” type=”name” required=”1″][contact-field label=”Email” type=”email” required=”1″][contact-field label=”Please send me …” type=”checkbox-multiple” options=”a free signed poster pack,more information about virtual visits”][contact-field label=”Your School / Work Address (necessary for above)” type=”textarea”][/contact-form]

Please be patient.  Our replies are not automated so you will get a personal reply.

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Ten literacy activities for children not able to get into school

The football is about to kick off again. For many children who won’t be able to get into school until September, this sudden summer of football action could be a great way to keep them reading and writing.

These ten activities offer a variety of ways to engage children with reading and writing for fun and keep them literacy fit for autumn 2020.

ONE Roy and Rocky of the Rovers Writing Kit. A set of eight activities designed to engage football fans with different aspects of writing using passion for the game as a way in. https://royoftheroversofficial.com/news/2343



TWO Listen to the seven-part story, The Mystery of the Stolen FA Cup Medal – read by a proper actor – and do the activities designed by the British Council.  https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/mystery-stolen-fa-cup-medal

THREE Learn to draw football star – Rocky Race – with the help of Roy of the Rovers illustrator, Lisa Henke: https://www.tompalmer.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Rocky-drawing-2.pdf

FOUR Read about how football and other things in Tom Palmer’s life directly inspired the storylines in his books. And how being into football made him a reader in the first place: https://tompalmer.co.uk/biography/

FIVE Read Call of Duty,  a short story about a modern footballers volunteering for war. Linked to his First World War football novel, Over the Line. https://issuu.com/barringtonstoke/docs/call_of_duty/1?e=2213880/7442461

SIX Encourage a young reader to read one of Tom’s series and receive a personalised signed certificate to congratulate them. https://tompalmer.co.uk/reading-certificates/

SEVEN Read the first chapters of 34 children’s books and read whole stories available only on Tom’s website: https://tompalmer.co.uk/free-reads/

EIGHT Have a go at a range of colouring sheets, many of them based around football books:  https://tompalmer.co.uk/colouring-pages

NINE Read a novel in sixteen chapters set at the last EUROs in France: https://www.tompalmer.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Over-the-Line-Euro-2016-Full-Story.pdf

TEN Contact Tom and ask him a question about one of his books. Please do this via a teacher or a parent and ask them to pass on your questions using the contact form below.

We hope that helps. Happy reading and enjoy the football.

Families … stay up to date with what I’m doing – or simply say hello – on social media.
Twitter: @tompalmerauthor
Facebook: www.facebook.com/tompalmerauthor/

Subscribe to Tom’s newsletter  – you can hear direct from Tom each holiday (3 per year) about new writing, preview chapters and exclusive competitions.  Please get your parent/guardian’s permission.

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I had dozens of school author visits lined up for the spring and summer. Most were cancelled or postponed overnight. As had to happen. Three days after school changes were announced, I had a call from a headteacher I work with a lot.

We’re budgeted to pay you to work with us and we’d like to honour that, he said.

Then a couple of days after that I had another call from a school. Both wanted virtual author visits. I was thrilled. And grateful.

I’ve been doing virtual author visits in schools for a while now. One or two a month. Easy going. Normally, I’ll chat to a classroom full of children for half-an-hour. And I love it. It was a fun addition to my main jobs of writing books and visiting schools.

But now – in world suffering Covid-19 – I had to step things up to another level. I had to use more platforms and be more innovative with what I offered.

Here’s a summary of some of the things I’ve been involved with since making that decision:

Dixons Academy, Bradford. I’ve been working with year five on story modelling, showing them – in a series of twenty-minute videos – how I research, plan, start and edit a story based in their area. Children are feeding back to help direct what happens in subsequent films.

Cotmanhay Junior, Derbyshire. The headteacher and I are co-writing a story in ten parts set on the estate where most of the school’s students come from. One ten-minute read is posted weekly as text and as a short film read by one of the school’s teachers. The story is called This Book is For You and is about a boy who hates reading – at the beginning.  https://www.cotmanhay-jun.derbyshire.sch.uk/this-book-is-for-you/

Tabuk School, Saudi Arabia. Tabuk set up a school writing competition with me acting as the judge. The children sent their stories to me via their teacher and I created a twenty-minute awards video announcing the winners giving back constructive criticism  on every story in the competition.

Kirkstall Valley Primary School, Leeds. Fifteen reluctant readers – but football fans – have been given signed copies of one of my books. They’ll read the book by a certain dates, then the head teacher and I will host a Zoom reading group with the children. The children will keep their book.

That’s four direct author-to-school models I’ve been involved with so far.

I’ve also done two Facebook Live sessions open to the public, but joined in by several schools. One on football stories, the other on the Second World War in fiction.

I’ve also written:

A five-part story commemorating the Battle of Britain 80^th anniversary with the RAF Museums where I am Children’s Author in Residence. With reading comprehensions for each chapter. https://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/london/schools/resources.aspx

An eight-part Roy of the Rovers How to Write about Football toolkit

https://royoftherovers.com/news/2343?fbclid=IwAR3LPTTbQAyYE5MbZBVDd34OknYIt6s1XH1MtbXfVn5t54RBVgW_CJwxCMc

And a teacher training/reading group on Zoom.

The above are just some examples of what I can do. But I’d be very happy to work with schools on bespoke ideas for all, or some, of your pupils.

And I know there are many many other authors out there who would like to work with schools in whatever way would work for you.

If you want some ready-to-go resources there are loads of free activities on my website relating to reading and writing sport and history. You can find them here: www.tompalmer.co.uk/resources.

My virtual visits page is here: www.tompalmer.co.uk/virtual-visits. Feel free to get in touch to ask more questions.

Thank you for reading.

The commemorations of VE Day’s 75^th anniversary from 8 to 10 May have been rightfully postponed because of the Covid pandemic.

There will be no street parties but there are still lots of ways to mark the occasion at home and in the classroom.

And the good news is that this very important anniversary will – all being well – be revisited on 15th and 16th August, when organisers hope to mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day and VJ Day together. You can follow their plans here: https://www.veday75.org/supporters/.

My forthcoming book – After the War – features scenes set on VE Day, 8^th May 1945. In England where communities celebrate the defeat of the Nazis and in Czechoslovakia where Jewish children are liberated from camps and ghettos by the Russians.

The publication of After the War has been postponed too. But I had already created some online VE Day resources that – even though the book is not available yet – families and schools can use.

A book cover prediction sheet. Look at the cover of After the War and answer questions about what you think the story might be about.

VE Day paper dolls. Work as a family to decorate paper dolls of the children of VE Day. Then put it up as bunting to help mark the 75^th anniversary of their liberation.

VE Day comprehension. Read the section of the book where the children talk about their very different experiences of VE Day, then answer some questions.

VE Day Black Out poetry. Create your own black out poetry using a VE Day scene from After the War.

You can find all the resources above and read more about After the War and the research I did to find out about what happened to children in England and on the continent on and after VE Day by visiting www.tompalmer.co.uk/after-the-war.

Check out our gallery of school responses to After the War here

You can pre-order the book at your local independent – or other – bookshop too. The independent bookselling hub – www.hive.co.uk – is great for this.

Thanks for reading.

The 2019 men’s Rugby Union World Cup is taking place – in Japan – this autumn.

If you are a sport-loving family, now is a good time to try to engage your children with reading for pleasure – through sport. Fiction. Non-fiction. Websites. Newspapers. Magazines. Whatever you choose, the Rugby World Cup can help. 

I am a children’s author who came to love reading through sport.
I now write sport fiction for a living. These are my ten top tips to encourage your sports mad children to read for pleasure.

1 Set the home page on your computer to a decent rugby website like www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union or www.rugbyworldcup.com

2 Get your children on form for the year with one of the guides to playing the game. Know the Game: Rugby Union is a great book to start with. Ask if your local library stocks it.

3 Deliver a newspaper’s rugby supplement to your child’s room on Saturday or Sunday morning to get them used to reading previews, match reports and other articles.

4 Buy them a copy of one of the popular rugby magazines, Rugby World or The Rugby Paper.

5 Read together a child-friendly player-autobiography full of statistics, pictures and childhood stories. Check first that the content is appropriate for kids. A popular one is by Jonny Wilkinson.

6 Play one of the fantasy World Cup games running in newspapers, requiring a close eye on who is injured and who has been dropped from teams. Another reason to read the rugby pages.

7 Discover superb fiction in libraries and bookshops : Rugby Zombie by Dan Anthony, Rugby Spirit by Gerard Siggins Pride & Penalties by Chris Higgins and my Rugby Academy series.

8 Leave rugby newspaper articles and match reports in regular places like on the fridge door.

9 Check out the RFU’s free literacy resources at www.englandrugby.com. Check out the other home nations’ websites too: www.scottisrugby.org, www.wru.co.uk and www.irisrgby.ie.

10 Try reading more yourself. You’ll enjoy it and your children will want to join in too

On June 6th we will be remembering the many brave men and women who were involved in D-Day, the daring invasion of Normandy when the Allies began the liberation of Europe from Nazi Germany.

There are several things happening locally and nationally that schools and families can do with to help their children understand those events of 75 years ago.

Here are some ideas of things you could engage with:

Watch the news. On 5^th and 6^th June there will be extensive news coverage of commemorative events in Portsmouth and Normandy, including the MV Boudicca sailing with 300 D-Day veterans from England to France on the same journey they made exactly 75 years before.

Get hold of a special edition £2 coin to mark the D-Day 75^th anniversary, featuring a map of the D-Day landing beaches. Something for children to hold onto and remember and maybe give to their own children on the 100^th anniversary of D-Day in June 2044?

Go to your local public library and check out some of the books about D-Day in the history section. Some books have amazing photographs in them and first-hand accounts. Most public libraries will have several books on the shelves about WW2 and D-Day.

Visit The D-Day Story, a fantastic museum in Portsmouth with a permanent exhibition that does a great job focussing the mind on the planning and actioning of D-Day. They’ll be hosting special events from 5^th to 9^th www.theddaystory.com/

Go online and search for D-Day links to where you live. The D-Day Story has an interactive map to help you do that: https://theddaystory.com/d-day-on-your-doorstep-interactive-map/. The Imperial War Museum’s amazing online collection allows you to search for images and recordings of the men and women who took part in D-Day and made it home to be able to tell their story: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections

Look out for films on TV, including The Longest Day, Saving Private Ryan and Storming Juno. The TV series Band of Brothers starts with D-Day and is very powerful. There will be documentaries on TV too. But make sure what you are watching is age-appropriate.

From 1^st to 9^th June the Imperial War Museum will retell the extraordinary land, air and sea story through their Second World War collection and three historic sites, HMS Belfast, IWM Duxford and the Churchill War Rooms, which experienced first-hand the events of D-Day. https://www.iwm.org.uk/visits/d-day75

There will be events in towns and cities all over the UK.Some places will witness flypasts of significant aircraft. There will be parties. And many airmen, seamen and soldiers will be remembered in their home counties. Check out your local newspaper’s website for information.

Read Tom Palmer’s children’s book, D-Day Dog, about a boy who joins a school trip to Normandy where he finds out hard facts about the events of 6^th June 1944.Use D-Day Dog as a class read. There are free videos, activities and other resources for schools at https://tompalmer.co.uk/dday-dog/. You can contact Tom for free posters and bookmarks for all your pupils too.

Some of you might be going to France for your summer holidays.If so, why not travel via Portsmouth and stop for an hour or two to visit some of the key D-Day historic sites and museums in Normandy. Visit the Normandy tourist information site for more details: http://en.normandie-tourisme.fr/things-to-do/sites-and-attractions/d-day-and-the-battle-of-normandy-113-2.html

Check out my Guest blog over on A Library Lady’s webpage

D-Day Dog by Tom Palmer – The inspiration for the story

here

On 6^th June this year countries across the world will be commemorating the 75^th anniversary of D-Day, one of the most significant days in the history of Europe and the world, which marked the beginning of the end for Adolf Hitler and his Nazi regime.

My new book – D-Day Dog – is about a boy who goes on a school trip to Normandy to find out about D-Day and to challenge his own ideas about war. It is also about the rights and wrong about using animals in war and is based around the true story of a dog that parachuted into the conflict on 6th June 1944.

I have created a range of resources that teachers can use in schools to work with – or without – the book to help children understand this enormously significant date. You can find them all at www.tompalmer.co.uk/dday-dog.

“An amazing exploration of war, both past and present, which answers difficult questions about why soldiers choose to fight and die. Stories from World War 2, the Falklands and the current conflict in Syria are woven together in this sensitive little book. ” Aidan Severs, That Boy Can Teach

I have made four short videos set at key D-Day sites in Normandy that are also settings in the book. Making the films at Omaha Beach, a statue of Dwight Eisenhower, Ranville Cemetery and in the open countryside of Normandy where many paratroopers dropped in ahead of the beach landings. Coming by 26 April.

Free posters and bookmarks that I can post out to schools for free – or that you can download.

I’ve written a guide to local and national activities that are going on to mark the 75^th anniversary of D-Day during the first few days of June. It is being hosted by the excellent www.thereaderteacher.com, also known as @MrEPrimary. Coming soon.

An activity for the D-Day 75^th anniversary this June 6^th. I have chosen some pages from D-Day Dog that you can download and print for free, then invite the children to create their own D-Day blackout poetry. Includes instructions for teachers, examples and a signed certificate for any children who complete the challenge.

While visiting schools I will be using a PowerPoint I have made to talk about D-Day, how animals are used in war and what inspires me to write books like this. You can download it for free here, whether I am coming into your school or not. Coming soon.

I am doing some public events during the spring/summer where I would love to meet readers, dog-lovers and history fans. In Halifax, London, Shrewsbury, Holmfirth, Edinburgh so far, but there may be more. Check out the Meet Me page on my website for full details.

I’ve made some book cover predictions sheets for the classroom, where children can work out what they think might happen in the book based on Tom Clohsey Cole’s brilliant jacket design for D-Day Dog.

Check out the D-Day Dog webpage for ideas about the rights and wrongs of using animals in war. The book features a boy whose love of war is challenged when he finds out that dogs were used and killed during the Second World War and other wars.

Download a document that includes ten questions to help children talk and think about war. Is it ever right to wage war? Should animals be used in war? This is aimed at Y5 to Y8 and should be used with teachers’ discretion.

Use D-Day Dog as a class read during the 75^th anniversary commemorations in early June. It’s a short novel at 20,000 words, suitable for Y5 to Y8. The anniversary coverage on TV should tie in well with the storyline about children trying to get their heads round such a significant historical event.

Thanks for reading. All the resources above are available free from www.tompalmer.co.uk/dday-dog. Those not published yet will be up by end of April. Please feel free to share them among your colleagues and networks.

Many thanks.

For the past few years I have asked teachers, librarians and other adults to nominate children they think would benefit from the gift of a book for Christmas. I would like to do the same for Christmas 2018.

My family’s idea is to work with teachers and librarians – who already do so much to engage children with the joys of reading and books – and give books to children who do not have any books at home; to children who need that one special book that could help engage them with a lifetime of reading for pleasure; or, to children who have had a difficult year at school or home and a book would be a boost for them.

Each book will be personally dedicated, signed, gift-wrapped and will come with a Christmas card. Those nominating can choose from any of my books for children.

If you’d like to nominate a child, please email the following information to admin@tompalmer.co.uk by Friday 30^th November 2018:

1. the child’s name (this will not be published and will be kept in full confidence)
2. a short paragraph explaining why you are nominating that child
3. your choice of book for them from one of the books listed at https://tompalmer.co.uk/about-tom/books-for-children/.
4. your name and school address (where I will send the book)

I am sorry, I cannot promise to send a book to every child nominated. I have set an upper limit of 50. But I do intend to send a personal Christmas card to each nominee and a poster pack for each school. My family and I will choose the recipients and have the books dispatched in the first week of December 2018.

Thank you very much.

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