Dr Sheena Wilkinson, the inaugural writer-in-residence formally launched the Bringing to Book project with an inspirational talk entitled ‘Children’s Books Saved My Life’, at the Church of Ireland College of Education on Tuesday, 8 October.
Sheena’s inspirational talk traced her journey from being the child who loved reading and writing to the adult professional writer she is today. Speaking to academics and librarians active in the field of children’s literature and to students post-graduate and under-graduate of children’s literature and initial teacher education, Sheena recreated her childhood love of reading and writing stories. She shared her early efforts at creating stories and how important her teacher, local library and librarian and of course, her parents had been in supporting and encouraging this creativity.
With this image of the child reader/writer in mind Sheena urged the undergraduate B. Ed. students in the audience to do everything they could to be the significant teacher who will encourage that spark of creativity in the children they will teach during their career.
Sheena will be on-campus in Dublin two days per week during this academic year, she will be attending Bookfest events around the country this month and for anyone interested in finding out more about ‘Bringing to Book’ and the residency, Sheena can be contacted at sheena.wilkinson@cice.ie .
LAI School Libraries Group 