That’s the title of my episode broadcast this week 14th March 2019 on Cbeebies and, well what can I say? It is. The Best.
I was first involved with Tee and Mo way back when it was just a few games. The lovely people at Plug In Media asked me to help them develop it for TV. Writing pilot scripts and an interactive story for the CBeebies Storytime App along the way, I feel like a great aunt who has watched her little charge grow up. Glad to see the show is a success and also glad that my episode this Thursday is… The Best.
You might not have been aware that it was #refugeeawarenessweek recently. No matter, the terrible situations that some people find themselves in sadly haven’t gone away so here are stories I wrote for #CBeebiesRadio
With some minor adjustments to protect both the kids in the stories and the kids in the audience, each is a true story.
You might want to rant that such subject matter is entirely inappropriate for young children but young children are living through these things. Stories are there to help us understand and find ways to deal with what is going on around us. These stories celebrate the resilience, courage and love of young people and nobody is too young to celebrate love.
If you have read this far, then (oops I didn’t ask permission but as I wrote it… bad me) have this:
Everyone needs a safe place to live,
Like a bird’s nest lined with warm feathers:
Full of kindness and love, it’s the place we call home,
A refuge from the world and the weather.
But storms can sometimes blow nests from the trees
And winter brings frost, ice and snow.
Birds have to fly south or else they would freeze;
To survive until spring, they must go.
Their journey can last for thousands of miles,
It’s a daring and dangerous quest,
Flying across deserts and oceans and isles
With little food and no time to rest.
And people too must sometimes take flight,
Like birds they have to migrate
From the cruelty of rulers and armies that fight,
Blown by the ice winds of hate.
This journey can last for thousands of miles,
It’s a daring and dangerous quest,
Crossing countries and deserts and oceans and isles
With little food and no time to rest.
But unlike the birds, these people have names:
They’re not just a crowd on TV,
They love and they laugh and they work and play games:
They are people like you and like me.
There’s Farah and Birhan, Hivi, Rafiq
With sisters and aunties and mothers,
Serbest, Amez, Natania, Sadiq
With fathers, granddads and brothers.
Refugee children love stories and art,
They love chasing and shouting and play.
They’re sporty, they’re funny, thoughtful and smart
And dream of being grown up one day.
Their journey can last thousands of miles,
With little food and no time to rest.
Crossing deserts and oceans with hope and with smiles,
It’s a daring and dangerous quest.
Then after the winter, the birds fly away,
But not to wander or roam:
They fly back to rebuild the nests that they left,
To the safe places they once called home.
And refugees too love the land where they lived
And many hope to return there they say.
When summer brings the warm wind that forgives
There will be freedom and peace there, one day.
Now that is a journey of thousands of miles
And a daring and dangerous quest;
Bringing peace and forgiveness, laughter and smiles
But of all journeys, that one’s the best.
For everyone needs a safe place to live,
When we find it, there’s no need to roam.
There we can grow and learn and forgive,
Full of love, it’s the place we call home.
Had to abandon several plans this summer because those lovely people at CBeebies Radio asked me to to write some stories and poems for them sharpish. Hopefully my friends, real and imaginary, didn’t feel too neglected and they, especially if they’re under six years old, will enjoy the results. You can hear them from today on the BBC iplayer radio app, just look for the Cbeebies bug! Then from next Monday 6th November you can download my story The Paintpots from the CBeebies website
The following Monday your little ones will be able to hear all about a quite magnificent Sock Drawer!
And in between listen out for poems about the sounds of colours – how do they sound to you?
Developing and writing these was a blast and an education. Here are some of the key things I learnt during this project:
– Yellow is an existential colour
– D.H. Lawrence has a lot to answer for
– Snail snot should never be underestimated
None of these conclusions found their way into the CBeebies material, you’ll no doubt be happy to learn. Instead, your preschoolers will enjoy discovering, for example that:
The colour yellow is a primary colour
But it’s a great mixer and go between.
If blue gets all flustered, yellow really cuts the mustard,
Shouting, “Bananas in custard!
Hey look: we’ve made green!”
By train and plane, taxi and car
We’re travelling to Sheffield from Stroud and afar.
Like migrating wilderbeasts, salmon and toads
Although hopefully not eaten or squashed on the road.
On pizzas and parties we’ll spare no expense
At the annual Children’s Media Conf’rence!
I’m producing, tomorrow, the Opening Sesh
It’s a Question Time thing, in which we will flesh
Out the bones of kids’ media policy and stuff
And probably mention Brexit but without flimflam or guff
On panellists (and poets) we spare no expense
At the annual Children’s Media Conf’rence!
I’m over excited, I’m sure you can tell
Writers don’t get out much, oh you knew that as well.
Jayne World has gone all sing song with rhyme
But I’ll try to control it most of the time
On potions to pacify me, spare no expense
At the annual Children’s Media Conf’rence!
Oh this was fun to write! Have you seen Roy on CBBC? The cartoon boy in a real world. Well this is the prequel – Roy is five years old instead of ten. So it’s less about fitting in and more about finding out. He is a great character and the show is a lovely crossover from preschool to big kid content and I was very pleased to be involved.
This episode, Dr Roy, which involves bandages, biscuits and a ‘ba-doom ba-doom’ big hearted little boy, was broadcast a week or so back on CBeebies and of course I missed it. But hooray for catch up telly! If you would like to watch it, then here’s the web address: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08ffx89/little-roy-18-doctor-roy
And having too good a time to tweet about it.
This was on Wednesday, at the Broadcast Awards at Grosvenor House. I hope they had as good a time as me, although as nominees (or rather part of shows that had been nominated), they might not have been as relaxed as me, a judge, could be. I had done my bit watching and reviewing the programmes submitted for the Children’s 6-12 and 0-6 categories, then discussing with my fellow judges before voting. All I had to do now was enjoy the champagne and glitz.
There was quite a lot of glitz: dinner included some Sweet Pea Emulsion which I have only seen before on a Dulux colour chart, the bits of stem broccoli that usually fall through my colander, turnips the size of snowdrop bulbs and for pudding we had a dessert. That involved yuzo: Alison Moyet, what a great voice.
Jonathan Ross presided over the award ceremony which, despite him, seemed endless – about lots of programmes that I haven’t watched or did watch but have forgotten. But there was plenty of wine on the table and ooh, a bit of slate with some rather lovely petits fours that I was probably meant to pass round the table.
The older kids’ award went to My Life: The Boy on the Bicycle, a CBBC documentary (directed by Stefania Buonajuti) following a lad round one of the largest refugee camps in the world. If you are one of those people that talks about ‘these people’ then you need to see this.
The preschool award went to Topsy and Tim. An outstanding episode in an already excellent series. Written by Dave Ingham, the episode is about a pet dog dying. It is handled with such care, wit and honesty that it made me cry. I was genuinely moved by the story. I also cried because I still haven’t worked with producers Darrall Macqueen.
I didn’t stay until ‘Carriages at Three’ but left sensibly early, determined to get a good night’s sleep so that, with a new day, inspired by these great shows, I could work harder and write better. And find out when yuzu left the music industry and moved into citrus fruit based desserts.
Very pleased to have been invited to this last week. Not least because the magnificent Geena Davis was giving the keynote. If I wasn’t me, I’d like to be her. You can read more about her brilliant Geena Davis Institute here and its research into women and girls in film, or rather the lack of women and girls in film. You can also see their excellent See Jane Video which is far more eloquent than me.
Many of my fellow delegates were interested in the lack of women in the film industry but the research and campaign goes further to show the lack of women and girls in the films themselves. Don’t girls and women matter? Is it really true that boys won’t watch girl protagonists but that girls are ok with watching boys? Really? Why do girls have to be the ones that give way on this? What damage have we done, shoehorning our youngsters into gender roles? I’ve always wanted more from life than fashion and boyfriends and I can’t understand why women continue to punish their bodies with high heels and uncomfortable corsetry.
I got the feeling that the majority of the audience at the symposium would agree that women and girls deserve more from the media and from their lives. I love the motto, “If she can see it, she can be it”. It was generally felt that this starts right back in the early years, in kids’ media. I totally agree and hope that there will be a major shift in kids’ content away from girls being bossy big sisters, the sensible ones and the sidekick/love interests. I hope there will be an even split of protagonists and sidekicks and antagonists across the genders. But what I hope most, is that the big profitable organisations (public, private, multinational… broadcasters, film companies, internet providers…) that were represented at the symposium will not just say there needs to be change, but will pay for it: someone has to. There were some wealthy players attending and applauding the See Jane campaign – I charmingly asked a couple about putting their money where their mouths were. They fixed their smiles and moved on. Obviously they didn’t see this Jane.
Me! I had a brilliant evening at the Sandford St Martin 2015 Awards last night. OK so I didn’t win an award, but then I wasn’t up for one: I was a juror. But I came away from Lambeth Palace feeling like a winner. The evening had celebrated some of the best, most thought provoking, meaningful and, in some cases, uplifting media content of the past year: radio and TV documentaries, sit coms, murder mysteries, period dramas, bio-pics and everything in between. Some of the programmes had flown under the mainstream radar – the winner of the children’s award for example (Fettle Animation’s ‘Children of the Holocaust’ BBC 2) had first been broadcast at 4 in the morning as a teaching aid for schools! – so there were loads of titles that I came home wanting to seek out, others that I wanted to watch again.
The best thing though was being in the presence of some quite outstandingly wonderful people. Award ceremonies are always full of outstanding people, we’re there to celebrate the most talented after all. But this room was full of people who were not only talented and not only nice but really rather wonderful: men and women who clearly care about their work beyond personal ambition.
The winners of the Sandford Awards are can be found at http://sandfordawards.org.uk/the-awards/2015-awards/2015-award-winners/ I think you can also view the programmes there. Definitely worth it.
So why did I feel like a winner myself? Because:
But the best bit?
The best bit, the bit I enjoyed most came right at the end when fellow juror Tim Herbert and the winners of the Children’s Award, Producer Kath Shackleton and Director Zane Whittingham of Fettle Animation and I were about to leave. Standing in the hallowed hall, the home of the head of the Church of England, with its oak paneling and Tudor fireplace, surrounded by oil paintings of all the Archbishops that have gone before, surrounded by history and the host of unseen witnesses, the cry went up, “Anyone coming for a beer?”
Like I said, I was in the presence of some quite outstandingly wonderful people.
Earlier this spring, the Children’s Media Foundation was invited to take part in the jury for a new Children’s Broadcast Award. Having recently joined the CMF’s board, I took great pleasure in this my first official duty; as if I ever need an excuse to watch lots of children’s television programmes and discuss them over lunch.
The organisation giving the award is the Sandford St Martin Trust, an independent and non-profit organisation that seeks to promote and encourage excellence in religious programming and religious literacy amongst policy makers, journalists and individuals. To this end it has been making annual awards for the best programmes about religion, ethics and spirituality since 1978.
This year the trust has introduced a new award for children’s content. It was championed by Sandford trustee and broadcaster Roger Bolton who, like the Children’s Media Foundation, recognizes the importance of children having quality and variety in programming made especially for them: “It is critical that children and young people are exposed to imaginative works that open their eyes to the world they share and the beliefs people hold.”
There were ten programmes on the shortlist. Submissions were for radio, television and online broadcasts and came from a range of producers; from broadcasting behemoths such as the BBC to small religious charities and producers of teaching material. As a writer of fiction, I usually gravitate to drama but there were some brilliant documentaries too. There were some programmes, both fiction and non-fiction, that left me cold: a little too preachy and putting the ‘die’ into didactic. But the ones that really worked, that made me think and feel and consider in new ways, had one thing in common: people, real people’s experiences at their heart. Even the fictional ones. Their testimonies needed no explanation, no editorial interpretation. Of course there was editorial input: duh! But the programmes that worked best were constructed to let the stories, the ideas, speak for themselves.
But how can you compare a preschool radio show with a fluffy Christmas special or a hard-hitting teen documentary? That’s where children’s programming differs from the grown up stuff: it’s so much about the audience. Programmes have to be age appropriate; giving or considering a child’s perspective, and the best did just that.
Having watched the shortlist and decided which was the most fabulous and worthy winner of the award, I hied me to Westminster to meet with the other jury members: independent producer and children’s author Hilary Robinson, National Geographic Kids editor Tim Herbert and Senior Lecturer in Media Practice at Salford University Beth Hewitt.
It was a fascinating process: we each brought different perspectives and expertise and there were biscuits. We were pretty unanimous in the way we shortened the shortlist but then it got …difficult as we tried to tease out the best of the best. Like the Mole in The Wind in the Willows, we “scraped and scratched and scrabbled and scrooged and then we scrooged again and scrabbled and scratched and scraped” until at last – “pop!” we had a runner up and a winner.
And the Winner is….
To be announced this evening at Lambeth Palace….
You expect me to tell you now? I’m off to get ready for tonight’s ceremony!
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