Rob Lloyd Jones is the award winning children’s author of over 80 books, including the Wild Boy and Jake Atlas adventure novels for Walker Books. Here he shares six story-telling tips, and sets six simple challenges to help you write your own amazing story!

An in-depth and engaging classroom resource for an exciting Young Adult novel from international bestselling author, Angie Thomas! The son of a drug king, seventeen-year-old Maverick Carter is negotiating life in Garden Heights as he balances school, slinging dope, and working two jobs while his dad is in prison. He’s got it all under control – until, that is, Mav finds out he’s a father. Suddenly he has a baby, Seven, who depends on him for everything. Loyalty, revenge and responsibility threaten to tear Mav apart, especially after the brutal murder of a loved one. So when Mav is offered the chance to go straight, it’s an opportunity – in a world where he’s expected to amount to nothing – to prove he’s different and figure out for himself what it really means to be a man.

The first work of non-fiction by multi-award-winning author Jasbinder Bilan, brought to life by artist Nina Chakrabarti, is a joyful celebration of India and its people, places and wildlife. Watch elephants bathing from a houseboat in Kerala, marvel at ancient cave paintings in Bhimbetka, wander through Delhi’s bustling streets, and ride a train through the snow-capped peaks of the Himalaya. Uncover India’s fascinating history and culture, and explore the unique mix of the traditional and modern that makes India the incredible country it is today. In-depth teachers’ notes written by the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education and designed by Walker Books.

A chapter by chapter reading guide for the hilarious Bundle with the Britons! edition of Julius Zebra by Gary Northfield. From the celebrated creator of Julius Zebra: Rumble with the Romans! comes a hilarious romp and mad-cap story set in Roman Britain, cram-packed with jokes and bursting with action. Julius and his pals must go to the far-off and strange land of Britain to win over the crowds of Hadrian’s empire. But this will be no happy-go-lucky holiday. Instead of packing buckets and spades, our stripy hero and his friends will need all their wits about them if they’re going to survive their most wild and rebellious gladiatorial opponents yet – the Britons! With a guide to Roman numerals and a fun, factual glossary in the back pages, this is a fast-paced, funny and utterly bonkers introduction to all things Roman Britain.

With this engaging guide from MITeen Press, anyone can design and publish their own apps – no experience necessary! – and get inspired by true stories of young app creators around the world. Download in-depth teachers’ notes for this exciting STEM title and help your students become inventors! MIT App Inventor, which boasts approximately a million users a month, is a major research project of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.

Playful and colourful activity sheets to accompany one of our favourite picture books… Bunnies on the Bus! Watch out! Move out of the way! Hold onto your tails! There are … BUNNIES ON THE BUS! And they aren’t stopping for ANYONE! The bunnies have taken over the bus and they’re on a wild ride across the streets of Sunnytown! They whizz past the bus stop, swerve around corners and zoom over crossings on a non-stop roller coaster adventure! There are bunnies on the roof! Bunnies in the aisle! DO sit down, bunnies, or you’ll end up in a pile! Eventually, they come to a stop … at the train station. And what’s that they’ve spotted? A TRAIN! Uh-oh, here we go again… A hilarious romp of a book, with a fantastic read-aloud rhyming text and spectacular illustrations.

It is easy to become a #2minutesuperhero – in fact it only takes 120 seconds. If every child in every school became a #2minutesuperhero just once in their school life, think of the positive difference it would make to our world… This resource pack is based on Kids Fight Plastic by Martin Dorey, which challenges kids to become a #2minutesuperhero by completing 50 missions to fight plastic at home, school and on days out. Informative, practical and positive,* Kids Fight Plastic* shows how small actions can make a BIG difference!

A detailed unit of work all about animals! Written by the one and only, Nicola Davies. Nicola Davies, the award-winning author of A First Book of Nature, presents a spellbinding treasury of poems about the animal world, illustrated in breathtaking detail by Petr Horacek. Polar bears playing on the ice, tigers hunting in the jungle, fireflies twinkling in the evening sky and nightingales singing in the heart of the woods – there are animals everywhere. From blue whales to bumblebee bats and everything in between, A First Book of Animals takes you all over the planet to visit all kinds of different creatures. This book is a glorious celebration of life in the wild in all its variety and splendour, and belongs on every child’s bookshelf. Shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal!

A gentle and engaging teaching guide to accompany one of our most beautiful picture books. Certain to be loved by all budding bookworms. In this inspiring, lyrical tale about the rewards of reading and sharing stories, a little girl sails her raft “across a sea of words” to arrive at the house of a small boy. There she invites him to come away with her on an adventure. Through forests of fairy tales and across mountains of make-believe, the two travel together on a fantastical journey that unlocks the boy’s imagination. Now a lifetime of magic lies ahead of him… But who will be next? “A gorgeous homage to the power of the written word” Guardian

Discussion questions and teaching activities to accompany a well-loved Kate DiCamillo novel, The Magician’s Elephant Another classic in the making by Kate DiCamillo, New York Times bestselling author and twice winner of the prestigious Newbery Medal. What if? Why not? Could it be? When a fortune-teller’s tent appears in the market square of the city of Baltese, orphan Peter Augustus Duchene knows the questions that he must ask: Does his sister still live? And if so, how can he find her? The fortune-teller’s mysterious answer (An elephant! An elephant will lead you there!) sets off a chain of events so remarkable, so impossible, that you will hardly dare to believe it is true. With atmospheric illustrations by fine artist Yoko Tanaka, here is a dreamlike and captivating tale that could only be told by Kate DiCamillo.

Nevertell by Katharine Orton is a gorgeous, snowy adventure, set in the wilds of Siberia, full of magic and wonder, for junior readers. Our Nevertell teachers’ notes are incredibly thorough, detailed and engage not only the fiction aspects of the novel, but also the non-fiction context! A perfect teaching and learning resource for middle grade readers. Born in a Soviet prison camp, Lina has never seen the world outside until the night she escapes with her best friend, Bogdan. As the pair journey across a snowy wilderness, they are pursued by a vengeful sorceress and her pack of shadow wolves. The children will need every ounce of courage – and a whisper of magic – if they are to survive…

An in-depth discussion guide and activity resource to accompany a thrilling young adult novel! Featuring an author interview and an extract from the novel. Pip lives on his wits in the city of Clarel. When he pickpockets the wrong man, he finds himself in possession of a strange object – a heart in a silver casket. What’s more, the heart seems to be trying to communicate with Pip, and the royal officials who lost it will stop at nothing to get it back. Pip has unwittingly broken an ancient spell, and his theft will have far-reaching consequences for the whole city. As the ancient war between the Spectres and witches of Clarel reignites, the heart prepares to seek revenge for all it has suffered… Alison Croggon conjures a rich, immersive world with brilliant and memorable characters in this captivating story of loyalty, courage and friendship.

Welcome to Total Failure, Inc., the kid-run detective agency that is sure to tickle your students’ funny bones and inspire them to become top investigators. That is, if they can stop laughing at the clueless CEO, Timmy, and his sidekick polar bear, Total. In the enclosed kit for budding crime solvers, your students will learn how to identify the four obstacles detectives face (yes, there are only four), solve cases and become masters at deciphering clues (no matter how obvious), learn the all-important detective lingo by passing a vocabulary test (using Timmy’s foolproof method), and maybe even write their own mystery story to boot! CONFIDENTIAL: While doing these activities, your students are bound to think critically and creatively and learn some new and very useful vocabulary. Do NOT let on that any of this is educational!

Colourful and interactive activity sheets to accompany Sophie Dahl’s beautifully illusrated and adventurous picture book! A timeless story celebrating friendship and imagination, from an exciting new voice in children’s literature. Mabel lives with her parents in The Mermaid Hotel, by the sea. Mabel likes to keep an eye on the comings and goings of all the guests. Then one day a particularly in-ter-est-ing old lady comes to stay. There is something very suspicious about her, with her growly voice and her heavy trunks and her beady-eyed tortoise. And why does no one know her REAL name? There can only be one answer, Mabel decides … this guest is a SUPERVILLAIN. But even supervillains have a soft side, and as an unlikely friendship grows between the pair, their fantastical exploits take them well beyond the corridors of their seaside home.

A useful resource to help generate discussion about internet usage amongst teenagers and the impact this can have on health. Particularly helpful for PSHE lessons. From the award-winning author of Blame My Brain, The Teenage Guide to Stress and The Teenage Guide to Friends comes The Teenage Guide to Life Online, a balanced look at what happens to us all – young and old – when we spend time on the internet. Nicola Morgan explores the pros and cons of life in the Digital Age, from the information explosion to the growth of social media. Opening with a brief history of the web she then explores hot topics like fake news and online privacy, and draws on fascinating, cutting-edge research into how the internet and screen-use affect our ability to concentrate, our mood and sleep patterns. This is a book for families to share: a way for teenagers, their parents and carers to inform themselves about the many advantages and risks of life online.

An engaging discussion guide for a gripping new novel by bestselling YA author, Lauren James! Gabrielle is a climate-change activist who shoots to fame when she becomes the first teenager to display a supernatural ability to grow plants from her skin. Hester is the millionaire daughter of an oil tycoon and the face of the family business. Theo comes from a long line of fishermen, but his parents are struggling to make ends meet. On the face of it, the three have very little in common. Yet when Hester and Theo join Gabrielle and legions of other teenagers around the world in developing the strange new “Greenfingers” power, it becomes clear that to use their ability for good, they’ll need to learn to work together. But in a time of widespread corruption and greed, there are plenty of profit-hungry organizations who want to use the Greenfingers for their own ends. And not everyone would like to see the Earth saved… As they navigate first love and family expectations, can the three teenagers pull off the ultimate heist and bring about a green rising?

A fun and engaging activity pack for home and classroom learning! Adventurous, magical and brilliantly funny third book in the House at the Edge of Magic series. “Magically mischievous and sparkling with wit and charm, The Bookshop at the Back of the Beyond is an enchanting and delightful read. I absolutely adored it!” - Jo Clarke

Struggling to engage reluctant readers? We have the answer to your problems! Our Football School series is hugely popular with young readers of all abilities and these teachers’ notes are a great way for teachers and parents to push the discussion further. A groundbreaking new series from two bestselling writers that teaches you about the world through football. The first book is packed with awesome true stories, real science and fascinating facts and will make you laugh loads. When do footballers poo? Can you play football on Mars? What is a magic sponge? You will find the answers to these questions and more in chapters on subjects such as history, geography, biology and maths. Illustrated throughout with hilarious cartoons and filled with laugh-out-loud gags this is the perfect book for any boy or girl who loves football. Your coaches at Football School, Alex Bellos and Ben Lyttleton, are journalists, broadcasters and award-winning science and sports writers. Their knowledge, enthusiasm and engaging writing make them the perfect team to teach you how to score with your head.

A detailed resource pack with multiple lessons to accompany a fun and unique adventure series for middle grade readers! A funny, action-packed series for young readers who like their princesses not only prim and perfect, but also dressed in black! Princess Magnolia is having hot chocolate and scones with Duchess Wigtower when… Brring! Brring! The monster alarm! A big blue monster is threatening the goats! Stopping monsters is no job for dainty Princess Magnolia. But luckily Princess Magnolia has a secret – she’s also the Princess in Black, and stopping monsters is the perfect job for her! A rollicking read from the award-winning writing team of Shannon and Dean Hale and illustrator LeUyen Pham.

A fantastic teaching and learning resource to accompany the first book in a sequence of three incredibly powerful novels by the award-winning author, Kate DiCamillo. Raymie Clarke has come to realize that everything, absolutely everything, depends on her. And she has a plan. If Raymie can win the Little Miss Central Florida Tire competition, then her father – who has run away with a dental hygienist – will see Raymie’s picture in the paper and (maybe) come home. To win, not only does Raymie have to do good deeds and learn how to twirl a baton, but she has to compete with the wispy, frequently fainting Louisiana Elefante with her show-business background and the fiery, stubborn Beverly Tapinski, who’s determined to sabotage the contest. But as the competition approaches, loneliness, loss and unanswerable questions draw the three girls into an unlikely friendship – and challenge them to come to each other’s rescue in unexpected ways. New York Times bestselling author Kate DiCamillo returns to her roots with a moving yet witty story of an unforgettable summer friendship. For fans of Jacqueline Wilson, David Almond and Katherine Rundell.