About the magazine
Welcome to the Children’s Discovery Centre’s new online magazine.
The magazine was developed initially over two weeks in the summer of 2007 as a Wandsworth Summer Uni project, run by the children’s author and illustrator Paul Geraghty, and children’s author Saviour Pirotta.
The first week’s work with Paul Geraghty, supported by Linda Galloway, was with children aged 7-11, or Keystage 2; the second week of work with Saviour Pirotta, supported by Linda Galloway, was with young people aged 12-14, or Keystage 3.
The children in the first workshop came up with a number of titles for their magazine, and eventually shortlisted them to ‘CDC XTRA, CDC Zone, Art Writes, Junior Journalists, and The Brainy Bunch’. CDC XTRA has been chosen for this part of the magazine.
This is a pilot project, developing a template for future development. The long term aim is to create a magazine, edited by an editorial board of children and young people, which gives a chance for children and young people to submit their creative and journalistic writing and illustrations, in the form of stories, poems, book reviews, interviews, journalistic pieces and more. The primary themes are those of the Children’s Discovery Centre: reading and writing, creativity, school and all the issues that help or hinder us being creative people. This is a chance for you to have your say, and to share with others your creative work.
You can post your comments on the work that has been created, and in due course we hope to open the site for all your contributions.
About the workshop facilitators
Paul Geraghty
Paul Geraghty, born in South Africa in 1959, grew up among wild animals and began drawing from an early age. In spite of the idyllic surroundings, he spent his childhood fighting the Second World War. He took requests and drew aeroplanes for his classmates. He wrote and illustrated stories about the war. When peace returned he completed a degree in Fine Art and English with Higher Diploma in Education at the University of Natal. He funded his student life by playing keyboards in a band on weekends. Later original recordings got airplay, achieving minimal fame and no fortune. He painted for a year, taught English and Art for two, then worked as a copywriter for a year, winning awards in the U.K. and U.S.A.
Since moving to England in 1986 he has been an author/illustrator of children’s picture books (All but one illustrated in watercolour - The Wonderful Journey was done in oils) and teenage fiction, often visiting schools, libraries and colleges as well as conducting the occasional writers’ workshop. He travels extensively.
His picture book The Hunter was short listed for the Kate Greenaway Medal for illustration, and won the Earthworm Award (sponsored by Friends of the Earth), while Solo won the Children’s Book Award - out of 392 books, judged by 70 000 children nationwide. His first novel, Pig, won the Longmans Young Africa Award, and most recently, Tortuga won the Prix de la Ville de Cherbourg-Octeville.
Saviour Pirotta
Saviour Pirotta (who also writes under the name Sam Godwin) has written more than sixty fiction and nonfiction books for children, and his works have been translated into ten languages. Born in Malta, he has a special interest in myths and traditional legends from around the world (his titles include Multicultural Stories: Stories From Native North America; Multicultural Stories: Stories From China; Multicultural Stories: Stories From India, all published June 2006 by Hodder Stoughton)
Saviour was born on the small Mediterranean island of Malta. His parents, both devoutly religious, named Saviour after Jesus. Biblical names and professions ran in the family; his brother is called Joseph, he has two aunt Marys’ and his father was a carpenter. With such a background it may be a surprise that, as a child, Saviour preferred pirate and ghost stories to biblical ones. His granny fuelled his fascination with the pirate lore of the Maltese islands and Saviour never tired of listening to popular pirate legends. He particularly liked the gruesome ones!
Sadly, at Saviour’s junior school, there was no library, just a locked bookcase outside the head teacher’s office. So, instead of reading stories, Saviour listened to them instead. He would sit outside on a summer’s evening and hear stories from people in his village. When Saviour arrived at his secondary school he was delighted to find a brilliant library and he was soon hooked on books for the rest of his life. Five years later, Saviour knew he was going to be a writer!
In 1982 he moved to England to pursue his ambition. His first job was adapting and directing a play based on Maltese pirate folklore. After this he spent eight years working as a storyteller for the Commonwealth Institute, visiting schools and libraries around Britain. Saviour’s first book was published just four years after he embarked upon his dream of becoming a writer and since then he has written over sixty books, many of them best-sellers. Turtle Bay and Joy to the World, both Frances Lincoln titles, have won numerous awards and Saviour’s work has been translated into fifteen languages. Saviour also writes under the name Sam Godwin, creating fun science books for five to seven year olds. A Seed in Need was awarded the English Association’s Best Non-Fiction Picture Book award.
Linda Galloway
Linda Galloway trained as a journalist in South Africa in the 1980s and has worked as a news, features and production journalist both in South Africa and in the UK for 25 years. During ten years working on The Argus newspaper in Cape Town she covered health issues, supreme court reportin and extra-parliamentary politics during the ANC’s struggle for power and she reported from outside Victor Verster prison on the release of Nelson Mandela in 1990.
In London she has worked for The Independent and The Times, and is now a freelance sub-editor on The Sunday Times, helping to produce the business and news sections of those newspapers on a weekly basis.
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