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Jason entertained young book lovers at the East Finchley Festival for a fourth year, giving busy parents a breather after taking their toddlers around the food, drink, craft and charity stalls, set up for the annual event at Cherry Tree Wood.
With local bands playing on the main stage and school choirs singing on the community stage, thousands of people shopped and socialised in the summer sunshine, but parents had the option to step out of the heat for a while, as their young ones enjoyed the activities for children, including art, lego building and the Storytelling Tent.
That’s where Jason jumped into his session before he was completely ready, because children had already started lining up on the floor in front of him. From a handful of children who were barely old enough to sit up to a fully engaged six year old, Jason had to shape the session to fit them all, jumping between his pre-school exploration of the world around us, What Can You See? to the more anarchic rhymes of the mixed-up worlds of I Like To Put Food In My Welly and A Zoo In My Shoe.
Most of the children seemed to be 3, old enough to engage with the madness of such situations as sleeping on bread, swimming in cups of tea and pizzas covered with fleas, but with attention spans short enough to want to break off to play with the cuddly elephant, cat and snake that accompany Jason on his visits – and to wonder why there was a pack of crisps poking out of the top of a wellington boot and small wooden animals sitting in a sparkly pink shoe.
“Every session is different,” noted Jason, “But this one really kept me on my toes. The minds of these 3 year olds took me back to the time I was writing these books, with random tangents taking me off in every direction and then having to find the best way back to the books, while keeping them all onside.”
He concluded, “The fact that I couldn’t stop for breath – or water – for the whole event suggests that at least I kept them engaged. The children were as anarchic as my rhymes – it was so much fun.”
[…] treated younger book lovers to readings of all three of his three books in the Storytelling Tent at the East Finchley Festival where their energy, engagement and interest led to a session as anarchic and fun as the rhymes […]