Winter Workshops
As well as Women In Art writing classes starting up next Spring, it’s gorgeous to be running Winged and Wild Winter Wonderland workshops for children again on the Broads National Park in the Christmas holidays – morning and afternoon sessions available. We’ll be helping winter wildlife, making lanterns, ice sculpture, enjoying magical trails and storytelling with nature inspired literature (including many titles donated to by the wonderful Magic Cat Publishing).
We’re also visiting ‘Where Land And Water Meet’ at Norwich Castle Museum and going on an urban nature workshop exploring how to help Norfolk’s brooks, streams, rivers and Broads. All children on both workshops will be taking action to support biodiversity and the natural world and take home an illustrated copy of one of my Arts Council supported Natural Wonder poems, bird seed pouches, their own nature inspired art piece and other goodies.
Children eligible for the fabulous Big Norfolk Holiday Fun Programme – book: here for the Winter Wonderland workshops (December 21st/January 2nd); and here for the Norwich Castle visit and urban nature workshop (December 22nd/January 3rd – note that the afternoon session on January 3rd is FULLY BOOKED).
Food is included in all sessions and activity food boxes. Thanks to funding from Active Norfolk, Norfolk County Council via the Department of Education. Plus to the Natural Wonder team!
Finding Natural Wonder – featured in The Curriculum Compendium, edited by Rae Snape (Bloomsbury)
This anthology of inspirational case studies is a perfect addition to the National Curriculum and am delighted a piece on my work is included alongside such amazing ideas. You’ll be able to read how resources from the learning framework for my Arts Council England funded poetry collection Natural Wonder, with lots of references to working with Henderson Green Primary Academy on the Broads National Park.
Also includes a link to resources for KS3/4 I’ve co-authored for RAIN Umbrella, who work to restore degraded land in the Amazon rainforest – featuring cross curricula resources that feature authors, including speeches from Indigenous leaders in the Amazon, to poetry by Imtiaz Darkher, Rachel Carson and William Blake. (With a lesson plan on my poem commissioned by Norfolk County Council Dreaming of Albion, Sailing With Maud).
The Curriculum Compendium is published in June 2024 by Bloomsbury.
Lust for Life Show – Winter Nights, December 2023
I’ve been sharing thoughts on reading, art and getting out into nature for wellness throughout December with Hannah Young on the Lust For Life Show – Winter Nights, Sundays South Norfolk Radio at 8pm every Sunday. Did you know that thirty minutes of reading a day can give the same health benefits as yoga? Reading regularly helps prevent cognitive decline, increase empathy and decrease loneliness in communities.
(It’s long been a topic am passionate about but am also delighted to be currently training in bibliotherapy with Bijal Shah to support my work in communities).
Hannah’s show is all about getting cozy, battening down the hatches and a space to focus on in the winter weeks ahead. So this is a lovely space to have a wellbeing retreat on a Sunday night!
Time to curl up and indulge in crime at Christmas
It was a pleasure to be interviewed by journalist Eleanor Davis for her feature in a US publication on why British people are so obsessed with reading crime over the Christmas holidays. I gave lots of tips on books to enjoy at Christmas – from The Paris Winter by Imogen Robertson, to vintage crime classic Mystery In White, A Christmas Crime Story by J. Jefferson Farjeon as well as Cambridge crime writers Alison Bruce, Gytha Lodge and Alison Stockham. Looking forward to the piece when it’s out.
