The Latest
Make This Year the Year of the Author Visit
Every student deserves to experience an author visit. It doesn’t matter if they attend a rural Title I school in York County, Nebraska or an elite prep school on the Upper West Side of New York City, every student should have the opportunity to experience an author...
News & Events
Five More Authors Join The Author Village!
It’s time to share some fantastic news! The Author Village is thrilled to welcome five more extraordinary book creators to our collective. All are available for virtual and in-person (when they return) school visits, library events, conferences, and festivals. Each...
A Fireside Chat: School in 2020, What’s Working and What’s Not
School in 2020: What’s Working and What’s Not
Fine Tuning While Teaching in Three Different School Models
Three expert educators — Sara Ahmed, Chad Everett, and Pernille Ripp — are currently teaching in three different school re-entry models: in-person, hybrid/concurrent, and fully remote. Join them as they share real talk about teaching in this challenging moment in time.
Webinar: Supporting Joyful Reading During a Pandemic – Sustaining Communities
The fourth and final session of this series of fun, interactive workshops focused on how to create and sustain reading joy during these unusual times. Session features an appearance by author/illustrator Debbie Ridpath Ohi.
Webinar: Redefining Back-to-School Basics, Vol II: Working With What We Have Now
Learn to surf the change, sidestep the fatigue, and give kids what they need, working with the tools we already within the current paradigm.
Webinar: Supporting Joyful Reading During a Pandemic – Encouraging Choice
Join Donalyn Miller and Jennifer LaGarde for the third interactive workshop focused on how to create and sustain reading joy during these unusual times. Session features surprise guest author, Torrey Maldonado.
Webinar: Supporting Joyful Reading During a Pandemic – Accessing the World
Watch the replay! This session includes strategies, resources, and book recommendations for connecting readers with stories, information, and one another. Plus, a surprise visit from Brandy Colbert, award-winning author of several books for children and teens, including The Voting Booth, The Only Black Girls in Town, The Revolution of Birdie Randolph, and Stonewall Book Award winner Little & Lion.
Webinar: Supporting Joyful Reading During a Pandemic – Reclaiming Your Time
Watch the replay! This session includes strategies, resources, and book recommendations for feeding kids’ reading momentum and interest, while maximizing reading time–yours and theirs. Session features a surprise visit from award-winning author/illustrator, Mike Curato!
Webinar: Redefining Back-to-School Basics
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Webinar: Languages and Literacies – Supporting and Empowering Multilingual Learners
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Eight Educators Join The Author Village!
Now more than ever, teachers and educators need our support. They need tools, guidance, and resources so that they're able to learn and grow as professionals, and so that they're able to help expand the minds and enrich the lives of their students in this constantly...
Webinar: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid.
Watch the replay! Erin Entrada Kelly and Ronald L. Smith, In Conversation. How scary is too scary? Do kids need scares in a sometimes already scary world? How do writers handle frightening scenes for kids? Don’t miss this eye-opening (and perhaps bone-chilling) discusion from masters of this craft. Newbery Award-winning author Erin Entrada Kelly (Hello, Universe) and Coretta Scott King Award-winning author Ronald L. Smith (Hoodoo) will share their secrets on how they approach writing scary scenes for young readers and take your questions. It’s sure to be a frightfully good time.
Webinar: The Disconnect – Girls Sharing Their Truths
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Webinar: Fighting the Good Fight
Watch the replay! Get ready for one powerful conservation! Bestselling and award-winning authors Samira Ahmed and Brendan Kiely discuss how young adults empower themselves as they confront systemic -isms (such as racism, sexism, and bigotry) and the impact on teens when they are held accountable for the unjust decisions made by adults.
Webinar: Amor and the Word – Writing Culture, Community, and Family into Our Stories
Watch the replay! Multi-award-winning authors Pablo Cartaya and Isabel Quintero discuss how they use their own cultural experiences to bring their stories to life. In an organic back and forth discussion covering everything from bilingualism, cultural identity, and the world we currently live in, Isabel and Pablo will engage on what gives their stories “vida”, and the ways to move the conversation forward through the novels they write.
Webinar: Atrevidas – Latinx Girls in Fiction for Young People
Watch the replay! Don’t miss Morris-award winner Isabel Quintero and Newbery-award winner Meg Medina discussing the girls who challenge expectations and rules in their picture books, novels, and non-fiction works. Why do these characters matter to the authors and to readers – and what do they tell us about ourselves?
Webinar: Girl Power in Books and the Ability to Change Lives
Watch the replay! New York Times-bestselling author Aisha Saeed writes books that showcase the struggles of girls and young women around the world. Indie bestselling author Stacy McAnulty writes about everyday problems of tween girls that are too often trivialized. Don’t miss Aisha and Stacy as they embrace feminism in writing, share their journeys to bring these stories to life, and answer your questions.
Webinar: From Illustrating to Writing – How Two Illustrators Made the Transition into Writing
Watch the replay! Angela Dominguez and Juana Martinez-Neal, In Conversation. Pura Belpré Honoreé and creator of Stella Diaz Has Something to Say, Angela Dominguez, and Caldecott Honor winner and creator of Alma and How She Got Her Name, Juana Martinez-Neal, team up for an eye-opening discussion about their publishing careers. Both Angela and Juana started writing after making their mark in children’s books by reinterpreting traditional fairy tales. They will share how they write from an illustrator’s perspective and how they include their personal lives in their work.
Webinar: Second Sight – How We Revise
Watch the replay! Kate Messner and Padma Venkatraman, In Conversation. Revision involves seeing something a second (or third, or fifteenth) time – yet most authors groan, just as loudly as students in schools when they’re told to revise their work. Be sure to check out Kate Messner and Padma Venkatraman, two award-winning authors who’ve grown to love revision, pull back the curtain on their processes and share practical exercises and tips for writers. They also discuss ideas for adapting their tried-and-true revision strategies for teachers to use in the classroom.
Webinar: Finding Facts through Fiction – Using Middle Grade Novels to Bridge the Gaps Between Creativity and Research
Watch the replay! Award-winning authors Brandy Colbert and Elana K. Arnold will discuss their middle grade novels, The Only Black Girls in Town and A Boy Called Bat and will share insights about how their fiction is created by combining real-life experiences, “what if” questions, and true facts about history, animal husbandry, race, and neuroatypicality.
Webinar: Chasing Unicorns with Shannon Hale and LeUyen Pham
Watch the replay! Newberry Honor winner Shannon Hale and Caldecott Honor winner LeUyen Pham have worked together for several years and have been friends for longer than that. Together with Dean Hale, they are the creators of the best-selling Princess in Black series. They are also the creators of the New York Times-bestselling graphic novels Real Friends and Best Friends. Don’t miss these two creators as they discuss making stories together, where their inspiration comes from, and how being best friends on this journey makes it all so much sweeter.
Get in Touch
If you’re interested in having one of the authors or illustrators from The Author Village visit your school or attend your event, either in-person or virtually, or if you have a general question, please fill out the following form: