Hello. Welcome to my website. I hope you enjoy your visit.
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I am a children’s author. Along with writing stories, my specialism is creating resources for teachers and learners to stimulate creative writing and to teach maths, science, phonics and spelling in an innovative way. The aim is to diversify the way in which these core topics are approached, expanding on traditional approaches to make writing and learning, fun, creative and engaging. (Click images to enlarge.)
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Two series of books, Using Stories to teach Maths and Using Stories to teach Science have been published by Hopscotch Educational Publishing in the UK, containing stories, sketches and poems backed up with resources to support inventive, artistic and original ways of teaching these subjects. The books were also published separately in New Zealand & Australia.

Some of the books were illustrated by my dad, Brian Way. Originally the publishers only wanted to commission professional illustrators but, once they saw the quality of his drawings, they signed him up! It was an incredible experience for us to have the chance to work together on this project. Dad also illustrated over a hundred pictures for the book Every Phoneme Covered also published by Hopscotch.

As a tribute to my dad, I recently published the series of stories, Hugh McPearson Ten of Spades Detective, about an inept detective ostrich, which he also kindly illustrated.
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I have also worked with illustrator John Welding, on two of the initial Using Stories books and a book aimed at inspiring children to write creatively, Crazy Ideas, which was published by Claire Publications. As Claire Publications is no longer operating, I am working on an expanded version of the book, with the working title of Reluctant Writers Resource. The aim will be to provide ‘A resource a week to inspire creative writing’. John also worked with me on my books: Escape from Schoolditz and The Gobulins and the Globulins.

 

 

Illustration by John Welding from Escape from Schoolditz. After numerous failed attempts, the teachers finally escape in a glider cleverly made by their classes… nearly…

 

 

Illustration by John Welding from Using Stories to teach Science Ages 5 to 6. Professor Darius tries – and fails – to make a robot with all five human senses.

 

 

Three little pigs: Illustration by John Welding from Using stories to teach Science Ages 5 to 6. The pigs try to make waterproof tents from different materials… with mixed success.

 

 

For other publishers I have worked on several series of non-fiction books on science and maths topics, some of which were also published in Spanish! I have recently completed a trilogy of books with the series title of Spell Binding Stories, using a mix of stories, sketches and poems to support the teaching of spelling for the primary National Curriculum.

I have visited many schools in England and Wales, providing creative writing workshops and/or presenting my maths and science stories. For a few years I worked as a ‘Writer in Residence’ for schools in deprived regions of South Leeds and also briefly, in Pontefract. I have also visited international schools in France, Germany and Belgium, as well as a British services school in Germany in the middle of a military base! My most far-flung trip was to an international school in Egypt, where I was made welcome with a visit to meet Tutankhamun!

I’m still eager to visit more schools, including doing so via a virtual link, as I did a while ago with a school in Cambridgeshire. Should you represent a school interested in a visit, please feel free to send me a message via the Contacts page!

Along with other children’s writers I also contribute monthly to the communal blog, An Awfully Big Blog Adventure, hence the link to this blog on the website.