Category: free stuff

activities, Announcements, chapterbooks, free stuff, Junior fiction, New releases

Fantastic free Four Up In Lights activity pack

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We’re delighted to present a fabulous activity pack for Four Up In Lights, the third and final book in the fantastic early readers series by Sophie Masson and Cheryl Orsini, published this month.

The activity pack, which includes story prompts, a word search, colouring pages, and more, was created by our talented editing intern Ash Taylor. Ash is also a student at the University of New England, studying Writing and Publishing, and hopes to have a career in the publishing industry later. Ash much enjoyed creating the activities, and says: ‘I look after some children who really like vehicles like trucks and cars and trains. So I thought about what sort of activities they might like to do or would come up with on their own after reading the books and went from there!’

Thanks, Ash!

We are sure everyone is just going to love these activities, which are free to download, print and use, for families, schools and libraries. Please note however that copyright remains with Christmas Press and that the activity pack may not be sold or used commercially.

Ash Taylor

To access the Four Up In Lights activity pack, just click below.

four-up-in-lights-activity-packDownload
activities, Announcements, free stuff, Junior fiction, New releases, Teachers' Notes

Activities and teachers’ notes for A Very Special Moon Mission now available!

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We have some great free, downloadable activities and Teachers’ Notes available for A Very Special Moon Mission, which can be obtained from the United Publishers of Armidale website. The activities outside of the Teachers’ Notes have been created by Lucy Eddy, who also edited the book, and the Teachers’ Notes have great input from author Rebecca Fung and illustrator David Allan.

Find the activities here and the Teachers’ Notes here.

authors, Books, forthcoming books, free stuff, Illustrators, Junior fiction, United Publishers of Armidale

Fil and Harry featured book pages on UPA website

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We’re pleased to announce that Fil and Harry now has its own Featured Book pages on the United Publishers of Armidale website. On the site, you can find an information page about the book which includes links to pre-ordering and to interviews with author Jenny Blackford and illustrator Kristin Devine, and an activities page. The activities include Jenny reading an extract from the book’s first chapter, a word search puzzle, downloadable and printable colouring pages based on Kristin’s illustrations, and some great downloadable Teacher’s Notes packed with more info and activities. Check it all out!

Illustration by Kristin Devine from Fil and Harry, by Jenny Blackford
Announcements, authors, Books, Business, celebrations, collaborations, Eagle Books, free stuff, Illustrators, Launches, Second Look, small press

Announcing United Publishers of Armidale!

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                                                                ANNOUNCEMENT

Armidale-based children’s book publishers, Christmas Press and Little Pink Dog Books, are delighted to announce a brand-new joint initiative, United Publishers of Armidale, with the launch of a new website, www.unitedpublishersofarmidale.net, and associated social media on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

The United Publishers of Armidale website features a number of books from each publisher, with free activities and resources to go with each, as well as information on each title. Activities and resources include audio and video presentations by creators, puzzles, quizzes, word searches, printable colouring pages, teachers’ notes, and more. The Featured Books page will be updated regularly with new, upcoming and backlist titles and their associated activities, while the About page gives information about the UPA partner publishers.

‘The idea behind United Publishers of Armidale is that in these difficult times, it makes sense for publishers, especially small, regionally-based publishers like us, to pool our efforts and resources in order to promote and showcase our books and help to support our creator communities, and we’re thrilled to be partnering with Little Pink Dog Books on this,’ said Sophie Masson, co-director of Christmas Press. ‘But it’s also very much about supporting the wider community, especially children, their families, teachers and carers, by offering free resources and activities through a dedicated website.’

‘We are delighted to be partnering with Christmas Press in this new enterprise and we hope that everyone will have lots of fun discovering our featured books and the activities around them,’ said Kathy Creamer, co-director of little Pink Dog Books. ‘And we warmly thank our authors and illustrators for getting so enthusiastically behind the project and creating such fabulous and diverse activities for our readers.’

Books featured for the website launch are, for Christmas Press, middle grade historical fantasy novel, The Phantasmic Detective Agency, by Julian Leatherdale (out May 2020) and Australian Children Laureate Ursula Dubosarsky’s recent collection of plays, The Boy Who Could Fly and Other Magical Plays for Children(2019); and for Little Pink Dog Books, author-illustrator Trish Donald’s picture book Tissy Woo and the Worry Monsters(2018) and Parmesan, The Reluctant Racehorse, written by Jacqui Halpin and illustrated by John Phillips (2017).

Check it all out here!

Directors of Christmas Press and Little Pink Dog Books in Armidale, Christmas 2018.
L to R: Kathy Creamer(LPDB); Sophie Masson (CP); Fiona McDonald(CP); David Allan(CP) and Peter Creamer(LPDB)

Announcements, audiobooks, Books, free stuff, Picture books

In times of trouble, a free gift for our readers and supporters

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In this difficult and troubling time  that we are all facing now, we’ve been thinking of ways in which we can support not only our wonderful books community but also the wider community, and soon we’ll be letting you know about an exciting development we are working on. In the meantime, we’d like to offer all our readers, supporters and friends a free gift: the full digital audio book of Two Trickster Tales from Russia, accessible either below on this post (for mobiles) or on the right-hand side of this site(for laptops and tablets)–simply click on the audio player for the full audio book and enjoy! (There’s also samples, if you want to just check it out briefly). Great for children and families homeschooling!

And if you’d like to have the full audio book to keep, just head on over to our Bandcamp store, where we are making the digital audiobook of Two Trickster Tales from Russia available anywhere in the world for whatever you would like to pay, from AUD $1 up.  If you’d like the print book to go with it, if you live in Australia, head on over to your favourite bookshop online, or post free from our partner business, Granny Fi’s Toy Cupboard. 

If you live overseas and would like the print book, contact us at contact@christmaspresspicturebooks.com for international postage rates.