Member Profile

Joyce Grant

Photo: Beverley Daniels Photography 2015

Joyce Grant is an author, freelance journalist and literacy advocate. She also has a background in marketing and advertising.

Joyce does presentations and workshops in schools including author readings, journalism workshops and presentations, writers' craft workshops and literacy presentations for parents.

Middle-grade Novel
TAGGED OUT (Lorimer Publishing)
A fast-paced middle-grade book about baseball, for reluctant readers. Includes a strong secondary character who is gay.

Picture books
GABBY (2013, illus: Jan Dolby, pub: Fitzhenry & Whiteside)
GABBY: DRAMA QUEEN (2013, illus: Jan Dolby, pub: Fitzhenry & Whiteside)
GABBY: WONDER GIRL (2016, illus: Jan Dolby, pub: Fitzhenry & Whiteside)
When Gabby drops her magic book, all of the letters fall out. Whatever she spells with those letters comes to life! Includes two pages of literacy activities.

Websites
Teaching Kids News, www.teachingkidsnews.com
Free, daily, kid-friendly news for teachers, parents and students. Each article includes curriculum questions. Readable, teachable news.

Getting Kids Reading, www.gkreading.com
Activities, games, resources and book ideas to help you get -- and keep -- kids reading.

Joyce's Author Blog, www.joycegrantauthor.com
About Joyce's books, events and presentations. Includes a kids' gallery of Gabby images.

E-mail: joycehgrant@gmail.com
Phone number:
c/o Writers' Union of Canada

Publications

GABBY. Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2013
GABBY: DRAMA QUEEN. Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2013
GABBY: WONDER GIRL. Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2016
TAGGED OUT. Lorimer, 2016

Awards

Ontario Library Association "OLA Top 10 Best Bets," picture book category for GABBY, 2014
Winner, Rainforest of Reading Award (Montserrat) for GABBY, 2015
Rainforest of Reading Award Nominee for GABBY, 2014
Links:
Teaching Kids News
http://www.teachingkidsnews.com
,
Getting Kids Reading
http://www.gkreading.com
,
Author blog for Joyce Grant
http://www.joycegrantauthor.com
Eligible for National Public Readings Program :
Yes

WITS

Presentation Description

For Primary students (K-3): Gabby, Gabby: Drama Queen, Gabby: Wonder Girl
These picture books are about a girl who drops her magic book and the letters fall out. Whatever she spells with those letters comes to life! "Gabby" helps children sound out words and emphasizes text-to-real-world connections.

My presentation includes a reading and a PowerPoint-based presentation that shows children the process of creating "Gabby," including illustrations. "Gabby: Drama Queen" is suitable for older primary studens because the words in it are slightly more challenging (stressing consonant blends). "Gabby: Wonder Girl" uses question words.

Please visit joycegrantauthor.com for free colouring pages and a free Gabby Teacher's Guide!

For Junior students (grade 4+): Teaching Kids News, based on www.TeachingKidsNews.com
This presentation is customized to the needs of the specific class (depending on what they are currently studying). Options include discussing one news article in-depth and doing a media literacy activity based on it; discussing the week's news and answering questions about the articles; discussing journalism and how a journalist reports the news; critical thinking regarding the media; and discussing various media.

We can also discuss how news is gathered and a news article is written (the inverted pyramid style). We can also workshop a class or school newsletter.

For Junior students (4-6 and beyond): Writing workshops
I conduct writing workshops on journalism and on picture books. In the picture book workshop, we talk about structure and then design and create an actual picture book based on the curriculum your class is currently studying! (It's awesome.)

For parents and caregivers: Literacy, based on Getting Kids Reading (www.gkreading.com)

This website was founded in 2008 to help parents get, and keep, kids reading. It stresses the three most important literacy strategies for parents: reading to your child every day, keeping many books around the house, and modelling reading for your child. My presentation covers those three concepts and offers parents many strategies, games, literacy board game suggestions, online resources, research information and activities parents can use at home. This presentation can also be geared to teachers.

Presentation Length:
About 40 minutes for picture books, 1 hour for journalism, media literacy or marketing, literacy and writers' craft
Genre:
Picture books, Journalism and Media Lit, Literacy, Writers' Craft, Marketing/Advertising
Grades:
K to 1 for picture books, grade 4 and up for journalism and marketing, Literacy presentation is geared to parents, Writers' Craft is for any age
Audience size:
Small or large groups are fine.
Workshop Description:

Writers' Craft
This workshop begins with a discussion of how story ideas come about. We then look a series of "story starters" from which students develop their own characters, settings and plots. Later, students will write a story, newspaper article, poem or picture book.

Journalism
Students learn how news is gathered for an article and they come up with their own ways of gathering information. We work on creating a newsletter for the class or school, stressing how the news is gathered, written (inverted pyramid style) and prioritized.

Marketing/Advertising
Students learn how marketing plans are created and develop an ad campaign for a product or service.

Northern OAC WITS:
Yes
One session:
$250
Two sessions:
$500
Three sessions:
$750
Four sessions:
$1,000
GST:
GST applicable