Our favourite weblinks for home learning

The team at Lovemybooks has put together a list of weblinks that may be helpful to you during the time parents and children are spending at home together  during the current crisis. 

Our main focus is authors, books and literacy but we’ve also included museums and art galleries and other creative learning opportunities to explore. 

 

 

 

General links related to books and authors:

British Library  Explore the British Library’s Discovering Children’s Books resources. Learn to draw a Gruffalo with Axel Scheffler and see their creative activity ideas 

Authorfy free registration to access videos of authors talking about their work

Audible free  access to audio books, including classics such as Winnie the Pooh and a number of traditional stories

National Shelf Service  The National Shelf Service is a new daily YouTube broadcast featuring book recommendations from professional librarians. Daily videos will focus on helping children and families discover new, diverse reading experiences. The broadcast will run here Monday to Friday at 11.00am each day. The selected titles will be available to borrow as e-books from most local libraries via their websites.

 

Comics newspapers

First News Newspaper for children and other resources including guidance for parents on explaining racism or scary news stories.

Phoenix Q club Phoenix comic offering a free club on Twitter and Facebook

       Alya the Pacemaker free magazine for children with information and activities about Science, Maths, Technology and History. 

Poets

Michael Rosen’s YouTube channel  

Joseph Coelho

 

These author illustrators live drawing workshops on a weekly or daily basis

Rob Biddulph daily ‘Draw along with Rob’ on Twitter @RobBiddulph then posted on his website

Steve Lenton regular draw along sessions

Ed Vere twice weekly videos showing how to draw some of Ed’s favourite characters

Steve Antony storytime and draw a story masterclass 

Lydia Monks learn to draw characters from her stories from ladybirds to unicorns

Sarah McIntyre #DrawingwithSarah shows how to draw characters from her books

Clara Vulliamy video on drawing characters including Dot the Detective.

Nick Sharratt – videos about drawing some of his favourite characters

 

Authors offering creative writing ideas

Alex T Smith daily story starters 

Robin Stevens weekly writing prompts on her website

Creative writing with Zanib Mian

Storytelling

Benji Davies reading his stories on YouTube, see #BenjiDavies Reads

Oliver Jeffers is providing a stay at home storytime

Frank Cottrell Boyce has read instalments of his stories on Instagram and is now running a children’s bookclub with readings and author interviews on Instagram.

Piers Torday is reading  his stories  on Instagram

Cressida Cowell UK Children’s Laureate Readings of How to Train your Dragon

Little Angel Theatre a wealth of storytelling/ performances  to explore with children

Fly with Tiny Owl a series of stories read aloud and ‘how to’ art and craft videos from Tiny Owl Publisher 

Ask the author

Author SF said is answering questions from young readers about his books or books and reading more generally every Tuesday from 1-2pm on Twitter. His address is @whatSFSaid use the hashtag #WhatSFSaid

For more author and illustrator related suggestions see Booktrust 

National Literacy Trust is developing a hub of resources to support home literacy learning 

 

Other stuff

New bitesize resources from the BBC – daily programme schedule for KS1-4

Scouts Great indoors Lots of fun sciencey activities

Konnie Huq magazine style programmes, science experiments, craft, stories and information on her YouTube channel

Nasa – Space/Kids indoor activity ideas and information about life in space including living in a confined space

National Geographic  Lots of fun facts for children

Chester Zoo is offering virtual days at the Zoo on their FaceBook page

Eclectic collection of free British Film Institute films for 3-7 years

Museums and galleries: lots to see and talk about!

Science Museum Free activities resources and games 

Natural History Museum Be a naturenaut, an immersive experience exploring the natural world 

British Museum, London includes an Interactive guide, scroll down the homepage to explore the collection 

Horniman’s Museum – lots of ideas for home learning based on the museum’s collection 

Look at art from around the world:

National Gallery, London choose one of their 30 must see paintings to look at and discuss together

MASP, São Paulo, Brazil

J Paul Getty Museum Los Angeles 

 

Books

Good Ideas – How to be your own and your child’s Best Teacher by Michael Rosen published by John Murray