Category: Subjects & themes

Goldfields Girl by Elaine Forrestal is a historical novel for middle readers featuring real-life nineteenth-century teenager Clara Saunders. In this blog post, Elaine takes us into the exciting, dusty, fly-ridden world of a gold rush.

This free event taking place at City of Perth Library hosts Isobel Bevis for a Storytime event on Thursday 23 January at 11.00 am. This Storytime event will feature Nedingar: Ancestors, a dual-language picture book by Isobel Bevis and Leanne Zilm, that won the 2024 Wilderness Society’s Karajia Award.

The Trans Book Festival is set to take place at the Wheeler Centre this February, featuring an exciting line-up of authors including Fremantle Press authors Alison Evans, Michael Earp, Seth Malacari and Kris Kneen, alongside other prominent voices from the trans and LGBTQIA+ communities. It promises to be an unforgettable celebration for both the literary […]

The Two-Hearted Numbat, Crow and the Waterhole, and Caterpillar and Butterfly are three First Nations picture book classics by Ambelin Kwaymullina and Ezekiel Kwaymullina. These three picture books are now out in new, small hardback editions – a perfect collection for the classroom bookshelf. All three books also come with free teaching notes. Activities include: […]

Activity Sheet

'Caterpillar and Butterfly Activity Sheet'

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In this adorable activity, based on Helen Milroy’s latest picture book Bush Bubs, students can colour in Australian baby animals, then work on their comprehension by matching the name to the image. Other fun learning activities include: You can download the activity sheet here and, for more teaching activities, download the free teaching notes here.

Activity Sheet

'Bush Bubs Teaching Activity'

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Join us as we launch Soaring with the Sugarbird Lady, the inspirational story of Robin Miller, a pioneering nurse and pilot who flew life-saving polio vaccines to remote communities across Western Australia in the 1960s.

Meet new friends with little Boab in The Boab Tree. This free video features Helen Milroy, author and illustrator of The Boab Tree, reading a story of friendship, resilience, and the Stolen Generation. Little Boab is lost and far, far from home. Surrounded by tall, unfriendly trees, he feels all alone. But the friendship of […]

I Am the Mau and other stories by acclaimed debut author Chemutai Glasheen is one of five Australian books on The White Ravens: A Selection of International Children’s and Youth Literature books for 2024. Selected by the International Youth Library‘s children’s literature experts, they represent literary and pictorial excellence with a particular focus on books […]

Yirga Gelaw Woldeyes has won the 2024 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award for የተስፋ ፈተና / Trials of Hope. Written in English and Amharic poetry and prose, this fascinating autobiographic work shares Yirga’s journey from boy shepherd in Ethiopia to human rights academic at Curtin University. Yirga is a writer, researcher and poet from Lalibela, […]

Yirga Gelaw Woldeyes is one of four writers shortlisted for the 2024 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award and in the running to win a $15,000 cash prize from the City of Fremantle, a publishing contract with Fremantle Press and a writing fellowship at the Centre for Stories. We asked Yirga to tell us more about […]

Nedingar: Ancestors, a dual-language picture book in Noongar and English by Isobel Bevis and Leanne Zilm, has won the Karajia Award by the Wilderness Society of Australia. Isobel Bevis – a Wilman, Ballardong Noongar writer who was born and raised in Collie in the south-west of Western Australia – said she was thrilled a book about […]

Year 6 student Julian Henningsgaard won the Phillip Pendal Young Heritage Award for his essay Words From the Past, which shares the serendipitous connection between T.A.G. Hungerford and the MillPoint Caffé Bookshop. We are delighted to publish the essay for you to enjoy, too.

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Environment Award for Children’s Literature, the Wilderness Society has partnered with The Wheeler Centre in Melbourne to host an exhibition of select illustrations from books shortlisted for the award over the past three decades – including works by much-loved author-illustrators Alison Lester, Sami Bayly, Oliver Jeffers, Renee Treml […]

Fiona Wilkes is one of four writers shortlisted for the 2024 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award and in the running to win a $15,000 cash prize from the City of Fremantle, a publishing contract with Fremantle Press and a writing fellowship at the Centre for Stories. Her desire to balance out the narrative around queer […]

Nedingar: Ancestors by Isobel Bevis and Leanne Zilm has been recognised for a third time in this year’s awards season. The dual language picture book has already been shortlisted for an Environment Award by the Wilderness Society and has been made a CBCA Notable Book. Now it is in the running for Speech Pathology Australia’s […]

Get the classroom thinking creatively, and help Quokka find a friend, with this free teaching activity. Working together or solo, kids can brainstorm the animals that a quokka would encounter on the beach and draw a friend for them.

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'Draw a Friend for Quokka'

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Using the illustrations of bush animals, get the classroom colouring in and writing the Noongar word for each animal in the blank space. Each of the animals can be found in the dual-language Noongar and English picture book, Djinang Bonar: Seeing Seasons by Ebony Froome and Leanne Zilm.

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'What animals can we see in the bush?'

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Enjoy a read-a-long with author Helen Milroy as she shares her latest picture book Bush Bugs. Hairy bugs, scary bugs, big or small. Let’s see if you can name them all!

Mark Greenwood shares mysterious true Australian stories in his junior fiction series, beginning with The Dragon’s Treasure and The Vanishing. In the teaching activity for The Dragon’s Treasure, budding reporters share the story of discovering treasure on a remote West Australian beach, using the newspaper template for the Pirate Times. For The Vanishing, kids create their own comic strip: drawing the moment […]

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'Create A Comic/Dig Up A Story'

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Mark Greenwood is a history hunter. He enjoys searching for lost explorers and glittering treasure, delving into baffling mysteries and investigating famous cold cases. In this piece, he shares his passion for the unexplained and how that resulted in a new series of books. Why these mysteries in particular? I’m hooked on mystery, history and […]

Get down to the Queenscliffe Literary Festival and visit Fremantle Press author and editor of Avast! Pirate Stories From Transgender Authors, Michael Earp.

Holding a published copy of One Wrong Turn in my hands was a dream come true. I never entertained the idea of there being a sequel and the fact that it now exists is largely thanks to the enthusiasm of Australia’s dance community and of course, the wonderful team at Fremantle Press! Dance has been […]

Nedingar: Ancestors, a bilingual picture book by Isobel Bevis and Leanne Zilm, has been shortlisted for the Karajia Award by the Wilderness Society of Australia. Launched in 2022, the Karajia Award for Children’s Literature celebrates the First Nations authors illustrators who create children’s books that honour a connection to Country and tell stories exploring land, […]

In 1989, Mecak Ajang Alaak led the Lost Boys on a four-year journey from Ethiopia to Kenya to protect them from becoming child soldiers. To understand these countries better, create a country profile for each of the following four countries: South Sudan, Sudan, Ethiopia and Kenya. This activity gives kids the opportunity to learn practical […]

Activity Sheet

'Create A Profile For These African Countries'

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