NEW

AN EXCITING NEW SERIES OF MULTICULTURALBOOKS FOR CHILDREN

BRIDGING CULTURES, BUILDING READING SUCCESS BRIDGING CULTURES, BUILDING READING SUCCESS

IWON’T GOTO CHINAPoor Chang-ming! He has been picked for the school team buthis family will be in China then, visiting his grandma. It’s not fair.‘I won’t go to China,’ he decides. But what about Grandma?And isn’t a visit to China the most exciting thing ever?Especially when it’s Chinese NewYear? Chang-ming doesn’tthink so ...But China is full of surprises!ISBN 978-1-84717-159-7 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:

EndaWyley is a poet and teacher and has had several poetry bookspublished, including Socrates in the Garden, Poems for Breakfast,ToWakeToThis. Her book for young readers, Boo and Bear, is in the O’Brien PandaCubs series and she has also written the highly praised The SilverNotebook for readers aged 10+.

OLANNA’S BIG DAYThere’s great excitement when the school band is chosen tomarch in the Saint Patrick’s Day parade. Olanna practises reallyhard on her tin whistle.At last the big day arrives and they line upwith the stilt-walkers, the bagpipers, the dancing leprechauns.Thendisaster strikes. But Olanna – with a little help from her grannyback in Nigeria – saves the day!ISBN 978-1-84717-171-9 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:Natasha Mac a’Bháird combines freelance writing and editing with lookingafter her twin girls. She is the author of The Irish Bride’s Survival Guide.Thisis her first book for children.

THE ROMANIAN BUILDERJoe has so many questions for the new builder:Which tool is the mostimportant?What if you are afraid of heights? How do you putscaffolding together? He is really disappointed when he finds out thatRadu doesn’t speak any English. Now he will never find out aboutbuilding – or will he?ISBN 978-1-84717-105-4 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:Peter Prendergast is

the author of oneprevious novel. Heworks in Dublin as aschoolteacher. TheRomanian Builder ishis first children’sbook.

THE DREAMINGTREEBack home in Brazil, Roberto loved playing the world’s bestfootball! Now he lives in Ireland, and he’d really like to have agame with the boys in the park, but he’s too shy.When his grannyreminds him of the Brazilian story of the dreaming tree, hedoesn’t see how a story can help him … But maybe it can!ISBN 978-1-84717-158-0 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:Eithne Massey is the author of the children’s novel The Secretof Kells and is also a short-story writer. She is a graduate ofUCD and NUI Maynooth. She has worked with the ArtsCouncil and as a librarian, and lives between Dublin andBrittany. She is also the author of Best-loved Irish Legends, anew collection of favourite Irish legends, published in 2009.

BRIDGING CULTURES, BUILDING READING SUCCESS

IWON’T GOTO CHINAPoor Chang-ming! He has been picked for the school team buthis family will be in China then, visiting his grandma. It’s not fair.‘I won’t go to China,’ he decides. But what about Grandma?And isn’t a visit to China the most exciting thing ever?Especially when it’s Chinese NewYear? Chang-ming doesn’tthink so ...But China is full of surprises!ISBN 978-1-84717-159-7 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:

EndaWyley is a poet and teacher and has had several poetry bookspublished, including Socrates in the Garden, Poems for Breakfast,ToWakeToThis. Her book for young readers, Boo and Bear, is in the O’Brien PandaCubs series and she has also written the highly praised The SilverNotebook for readers aged 10+.

OLANNA’S BIG DAYThere’s great excitement when the school band is chosen tomarch in the Saint Patrick’s Day parade. Olanna practises reallyhard on her tin whistle.At last the big day arrives and they line upwith the stilt-walkers, the bagpipers, the dancing leprechauns.Thendisaster strikes. But Olanna – with a little help from her grannyback in Nigeria – saves the day!ISBN 978-1-84717-171-9 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:Natasha Mac a’Bháird combines freelance writing and editing with lookingafter her twin girls. She is the author of The Irish Bride’s Survival Guide.Thisis her first book for children.

THE ROMANIAN BUILDERJoe has so many questions for the new builder:Which tool is the mostimportant?What if you are afraid of heights? How do you putscaffolding together? He is really disappointed when he finds out thatRadu doesn’t speak any English. Now he will never find out aboutbuilding – or will he?ISBN 978-1-84717-105-4 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:Peter Prendergast is

the author of oneprevious novel. Heworks in Dublin as aschoolteacher. TheRomanian Builder ishis first children’sbook.

THE DREAMINGTREEBack home in Brazil, Roberto loved playing the world’s bestfootball! Now he lives in Ireland, and he’d really like to have agame with the boys in the park, but he’s too shy.When his grannyreminds him of the Brazilian story of the dreaming tree, hedoesn’t see how a story can help him … But maybe it can!ISBN 978-1-84717-158-0 PRICE €7.99/£6.99 FORMAT 260x197mmHardback/32 pages

ABOUTTHEAUTHOR:Eithne Massey is the author of the children’s novel The Secretof Kells and is also a short-story writer. She is a graduate ofUCD and NUI Maynooth. She has worked with the ArtsCouncil and as a librarian, and lives between Dublin andBrittany. She is also the author of Best-loved Irish Legends, anew collection of favourite Irish legends, published in 2009.

ABOUTTHE ILLUSTRATORSThe unique illustrative approach featured in Bridges comes fromThe Cartoon Saloon, an award-winning animation and illustrationdesign studio in Kilkenny, founded by PaulYoung andTommMoore in 1999. The Secret of Kells, Cartoon Saloon’s flagshipfeature film directed byTomm Moore, was released in 2009.The book and the DVD are now available from www.obrien.ie.The Cartoon Saloon also illustrated the award-winning bestseller

The Story of Ireland, which is due to be released in a specialnew handy-sized edition in October 2009.

Ideal forclassroomuse

BRIDGING CULTURES, BUILDING READING SUCCESS

A Note forTeachers

Bridging Sameness and DifferenceBridging Cultures

Building Reading SuccessBridges is an exciting new series of beautifully illustrated full-colour hardback books for children,which celebrates Ireland's ethnic and cultural diversity. At The O’Brien Press, we believe in theimportance of story as a way of shedding light on children’s common and contrasting experiences,and we feel that the knowledge and understanding gained from stories can help bridge the gapbetween sameness and difference in the classroom.

With Bridges, children can learn about how people from a broad range of cultural backgroundsliving in Ireland communicate with each other and find commonalities in their experiences. Bridgespresents pupils with lively and engaging stories about many different experiences of life in Irelandtoday to help deepen their understanding of their own and other cultures.

With story levels that are accessible to a very wide age range, and a unique illustrative approach, theBridges series meets the reality of mixed-language proficiency and different reading abilities in theclassroom and also meets the teacher’s need to address learning differences among pupils.A book from the series can be given to a child with very little English, andanother book from the same series may be given to a competent reader.

Bridges may also be used as the basis for projects or classlearning about different cultures. With high-quality,entertaining storylines and engaging illustrations, the Bridgesseries is an invaluable resource for the Resource Teacher,the Learning Support Teacher and the EAL Teacher, and isequally useful to the classroom teacher engaging with themainstream curriculum.

Teachers!

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IRELAND’S INTERNATIONAL PUBLISHERThe O’Brien Press Ltd., 12Terenure Road East, Rathgar, Dublin 6, IrelandP: +353 1 492 3333 / F: +353 1 492 3333 / E: books@obrien.ieRights enquiries to: michael@obrien.ie/kunak@obrien.iewww.obrien.ie

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