Theresa Breslin
Articles, Presentations, Papers

Selection of some articles and presentations with key themes outlined.

Articles / Features

Researching Remembrance Shelf Life (2002)
(see also the Remembrance Research page)

Sharing Books and Stories with your Child
Renfrewshire Libraries - Sharing Stories

"When they grow up, children won't remember if their pyjamas were ironed or not when they went to bed, but, they will remember if they were told a story."

"choosing a book to read aloud… look for the Rs… Rhythm: Repetition: Raucous noises: Rattling good yarns: Riotous: Restful: Rib-tickling: Rhymes: inteR-active"


Times Educational Supplement 2/1/1998
Turning the Page

Read! Autumn 1997
Easy Reads, Queasy Reads… or What?
An appraisal of the development of storybook ranges with reference to reading differences in children

Publishers' supplement (Peters Bookselling Services 1997)

Rainbows arc inside me, says Solomon, the dyslexic boy in Whispers in the Graveyard. But Solomon's ideas abort, crushed because of his lack of skills in literacy. He is unable to write down the thoughts inside his head, which leaves him frustrated and angry. And, also, he cannot read ... Writing Whispers in the Graveyard seemed to crystallise my work both as a writer and a librarian. Books are prisms, diffracting the light from the minds of others, sending the colours flashing into our own.
And Solomon isn't daft. He knows what he's missing. The stories. He heard poetry on the radio once... the words stayed with him for weeks afterwards, searing his mind, thrusting and twisting in his gut.
Children ask me "Is this your book, did you write this?"
Yes I wrote it, and in that sense it is my book. But as soon as it is in print it's yours. The books, each one of them; the words, the stories, they belong to the reader.
So that rainbows can arc inside all of us.

"Rainbows…

 

 

 

Presentations / Papers

Strathclyde University - Faculty of Education, 2005
Boys, Reading, and Citizenship

Edinburgh Book Festival 2004
Power of Place: Landscape and Location in Theresa Breslin’s Remembrance and Saskia’s Journey.

British Council Hong Kong, 2003
Next Generation Series
Seminars for Primary and Secondary students, and for Teachers and Parents

ECIS (European Conference International Schools) Berlin 2002
Presentation on Remembrance: Fact to Fiction.
From author’s research notes, including photographs, letters, newspapers, journals of the time.

International Reading Association Congress, Edinburgh 2002 Children's Literature Symposium
Origins: Background and Relevance to Today's World

North Lanark Education Department Parents Conference on Literacy, April 2002
Imagination and Logic in Stories

University of San Francisco & USBBY Reading the World Conference, October 2001
Writing for Children, A Sense of Place

"Where young people are concerned author talks can be an enabling process for them as readers and writers. It presents a valuable opportunity to discuss their individual responses to a story and how they bring their own experiences to that story... How their own writing can validate their life experiences, culture, heritage etc and the importance of finding their voice…"

Institute of Human Relations, Glasgow 2000
Readers Responses

Carnegie Day, Brighton & Hove 2000
The Challenge to Today's Writer of Children's Fiction

Children, Participation and the Arts, Edinburgh 1999
Enabling Children to Expression in Literature

Association for Scottish Literary Studies Annual Conference, May 1999
Writing About Issues that Concern Children

Scottish Library Association Conference, 1999
Scottish Writers Project CD Rom -
an opportunity to inform the reading habits of a whole generation

Conference on Developing Readers, Dundee 1998
Developing Texts - Hard Graft, Serious Thoughts, and Fun

Scottish Library Association Conference, 1998
Youth Library Services within Local Government Re-organisation

Launch of the National Year of Reading 1998
Seeing Rainbows, The Joy of Reading

Irish Children's Literature Summer School, Dublin 1997
Letting in the Light - Storytelling & Stories

Federation of Children's Book Groups, Plymouth 1997
Turning Tides

Scottish Arts Council Conference on Children's Literature.
Moving Forward in Children's Literature