Author runs kids’ workshop
Local author Sue Palmer, 56, ran an interactive book workshop for roughly 30 Year 4 pupils at Watlington Library, telling the children she loved books that make you feel 'inside' a story — a small, tangible example of authors doing in-person outreach after the spring fair season. (henleystandard.co.uk)
About 30 Year 4 pupils from Watlington Primary School spent part of their school week at Watlington Library, where local author Sue Palmer led an interactive workshop instead of a standard classroom lesson. Palmer, 56, told the children she loved books that make you feel “inside” a story. (henleystandard.co.uk) The workshop took place at the library on High Street in Watlington, a small Oxfordshire town whose branch is listed by Oxfordshire County Council at Greengates, 35 High Street. That matters because this was not a festival tent or a school hall but a regular public library being used as a live reading space. (oxfordshire.gov.uk, henleystandard.co.uk) Watlington Primary School’s own Year 4 page says pupils visited the local library on a Wednesday and attended a workshop by Sue Palmer, adding that they had “lots of questions and comments” about her book *May’s Moon*. The school thanked the library for inviting them, which shows the visit was coordinated as part of the children’s school day, not a private event. (watlington.oxon.sch.uk) This was not a one-off stop by an author passing through town. Sue Palmer’s own site says she runs Key Stage 2 workshops for Years 3, 4, 5 and 6, supplies materials, and builds sessions around science, literacy and creative thinking. (sypalmer.com) Palmer’s workshops also have a local track record at the same library. Friends of Watlington Library said in a March notice that Year 3 and Year 4 pupils had been invited to a space-themed workshop with Palmer on March 19, and a school newsletter later said both year groups met the author of *The Secret Shell* at the library. (friendsofwatlingtonlibrary.org, watlington.oxon.sch.uk) The group behind that local organizing is Friends of Watlington Library, a registered charity whose stated aims include encouraging young people to use the library and helping safeguard its future. In other words, the children’s workshop was also part of a longer campaign to keep a small-town library busy, visible and useful. (register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk, friendsofwatlingtonlibrary.org) Palmer herself sits in two different corners of the book world. Her author workshop site focuses on children’s fiction such as *The Shell Secret*, while a separate publications page under Sue Palmer lists decades of education titles on literacy, writing and child development from publishers including Scholastic, Orion and Oxford University Press. (sypalmer.com, suepalmer.co.uk) That mix helps explain why the session was interactive rather than just a reading from the front of the room. Friends of Watlington Library said one Palmer event there combined social history and biology around *The Shell Secret*, and the school said another visit sparked interest in rock pool micro-habitats. (sypalmer.com, watlington.oxon.sch.uk) So the small detail in this story is the real one: about 30 nine-year-olds met a working writer in their local library, asked questions about a real book, and saw reading presented as something alive enough to talk back to. In a place like Watlington, that is what library outreach looks like when it works. (henleystandard.co.uk, watlington.oxon.sch.uk, friendsofwatlingtonlibrary.org)
