Rhyming and drawing fun at Arts Depot’s Book Buzz

Jason was delighted to get the chance to collaborate with north London’s premier cultural centre, the Arts Depot in North Finchley, by offering a mixture of readings and fun activities related to his children’s books at the latest Book Buzz event.

With a range of other activities taking place, from playwrighting workshops and badge making to creating edible books, Jason was visited by dozens of children, who stopped to hear excerpts of his books, enjoy drawing or learning activities based on them and left with stickers, bookmarks – and in some cases – signed and dedicated copies of the books.

For I Like To Put Food In My Welly, children were invited to draw the food they would like to put in their welly, while Jason read pages from the book to explain why anyone would want to do such a thing in the first place.

Jason was delighted to see that one child created a mash-up of this book with Rob Biddulph’s Show And Tell, including a sunflower seed and some blue spaghetti in his welly.

To go alongside A Zoo In My Shoe, children had the opportunity to draw a zoo in their shoe – some inspired by Max Low’s original illustrations, while others went off on their own flights of fancy, as they allowed their imaginations to go wild.

What Can You See? was accompanied by a simple activity sheet, asking children to join up certain pictures from the book with the words that describe them – or alternatively, to copy the words or illustrations.

A highlight of the afternoon for Jason was the girl who asked to have her photo with him, because I Like To Put Food In My Welly was her favourite book.

“The Book Buzz is such a great event to be involved in,” enthused Jason. “Families from across the area come down to inspire their children, with a love of reading and language, so it’s an honour to be a part of that – and getting to see so many children laughing – either at my books or at their own amazing drawings. They – and their parents – should be very proud.”