Puffin online festival
Posted on Friday, May 29, 2020
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The Puffin Festival of Big Dreams will launch on 8th June with authors and illustrators including Jacqueline Wilson, Robin Stevens, Nick Sharratt, Dapo Adeola, Nathan Bryon and Nadia Shireen across seven days of online activities to help inspire children to keep on dreaming.
The festival will be hosted on Puffin's YouTube and Facebook Live channels, featuring writing masterclasses, draw-alongs and creative challenges. Every weekday from 8th -12th June Puffin will broadcast two new videos at 10.30am and 3.30pm (BST), culminating in a live, interactive festival on the weekend of 13th and 14th June. Each event will be themed around dreams. Authors and illustrators taking part include: Jacqueline Wilson (former Children's Laureate), Robin Stevens (Murder Most Unladylike), Nathan Bryon and Dapo Adeola (Look Up!), Carrie Hope Fletcher (Into the Spotlight), Sam Copeland (Charlie Changes into a Chicken), Nadia Shireen (Bumblebear), Stuart Heritage and Nicola Slater (Jonathan the Magic Pony), Jamie Littler (Frostheart), Rashmi Sirdeshpande (How to be Extraordinary), Yassmin Abdel-Magied (My Name is Layla) and Lucy Hawking (Unlocking the Universe). The festival will be hosted by former Blue Peter presenter Radzi Chinyanganya and there will also be a special guest appearance from some real life puffins who reside on Coquet Island seabird sanctuary. The full line-up and programme will be announced shortly. Nick Sharratt will be the Illustrator in Residence for the week. Throughout the festival, children will be asked to submit their own big dreams online using the hashtag #PuffinDreamer for Nick to illustrate, creating a collage of children's dreams to celebrate the power of imagination even during the most challenging times. Jacqueline Wilson said, "Like so many authors and illustrators, I'm really sad that all the school visits, bookshop events and literary festivals have been cancelled. I'm missing sharing stories and chatting to children, so I'm delighted to be able to take part in the Puffin Festival of Big Dreams so we can reach out to everyone at home or school and share the magic of stories." Further details are to come on the Puffin website, here - where you can request an event kit - and on Facebook:
