School Visits: What I've Learned So Far

At this point in my career, I've written twelve books for the nonfiction school library market. Makes me an ideal candidate for school visits, right? Except that I don't consider myself an expert in any of the topics about which I've written.

So? I talk about writing. Research. How a book Gets Published. And I've just added some creative writing topics to my repertoire. Up until now, I've done all my school visits for free. What? Yes, Free.

I've wanted to get it right. Make sure I feel like I'm worth the money that someone is going to pay me.

Things I've learned:

1. Expect any question. How old are you? How much do you get paid? Things like that. Be prepared to answer what you want to answer or defer what you don't.

2. Be prepared with writing exercises if there are NO questions. Probably won't happen, cause the kids LOVE asking questions, but just in case.

3. Come w/ props. Visual aids, etc.

4. Be self deprecating. This works for me--I'm not a natural comedian, but if I use myself as an example of something, it's almost always worth a laugh. For example, when talking about the definition of constructive criticism, I'll sometimes say "it wouldn't be constructive for you to tell me that my shoes are ugly." Or something like that.

5. Go see the experts at School Visit Experts--they are a great resource and I can't give you better advice than they can. http://schoolvisitexperts.com/

6. Lastly, if you're familiar with school looking for inexpensive author visits, send them my way! I've recently updated my school visits information page -- http://www.kristineasselin.com/school-visits.html

Good luck!

S is for School Visits

I've had the opportunity to do several in my home town. For the most part, I talk about my nonfiction, but fiction always creeps in a little.

My favorite part is when kids tell me they've read my books. Earlier this month, a friend from book club told me her son picked up one of my books at the library and was excited to report that he'd met me at school.

They ask funny and great questions. How old are you? How long have you been writing? Do you write about your pets? Is your daughter in any of your books?

Before my first visit a year ago, I spent a lot of time prepping. This is a great resource to help you make an outline and plan for your visit. School Visit Experts

If you're prepared, there's no reason to be nervous. And the kids are really forgiving, if you falter. Think about the size group you feel most comfortable with--one classroom? more than one in the library? larger assembly in the gym? I'd suggest starting small, and then moving to the larger format.


This summer, I've got a weekly writers club for kids and a library visit in another town. I'm excited to be able to talk to kids about writing!

School Visits

My first official school visits were yesterday.  I mean, I've been in school reading my stories. I've visited my daughter's class with my books. But yesterday, I had three formal presentations to the entire 2nd grade in my home town. Topic: writing nonfiction.

I was nervous! I've presented to an auditorium full of first year college students and their parents, and a room full of 2nd graders made me nervous. But it was great. They were good listeners. They had good questions. And some of them have taken out my books from the library--that was cool.

Best comment from a little boy, "No offense, but John Lance was here yesterday and HE started writing in the 3rd grade."  This is all the funnier because I'm friendly with the Lance family, and John is fellow local author.

Things I learned:

1. Go to the bathroom before they walk in the room.
2. Have a bottle of water ready--cause your throat will dry up.
3. Be ready for ANY question (i.e., talking about my book WHO REALLY DISCOVERED AMERICA, one child asked "what about Adam and Eve?"  Someone else asked "How old are you?")
4. Be ready to fill in silence...with a question to them, some interesting thing about yourself, reading a bit from your book.

I had made myself an outline so I had a loose idea of what I to say, but I wanted to give them a chance to ask questions.  Next time I think I'll be a bit more formal. Powerpoint? Notecards?  I strayed from my outline a bit.  But they didn't seem to notice. :)

Next month, third grade.

School Visits

I'm so excited to have been invited to my local elementary school to talk to the third grade this spring.  As some of you know, I have two books on the solar system and one about the discovery of America coming out in January (click here for more info).

As excited as I am, my main goal is to make sure my presentations are interesting for the kids.  So in preparation for working on my presentation, I googled (what else?) "Tips on School Visits."  And I found a great resource!

School Visit Experts

This website has some great outlines, tips, and suggestions from people who have spent years presenting to kids.  I'm so grateful for the site!

I'm working on visual aids as well as an auditory presentation.  I'm planning on talking about the writing process.  I might put together a power point presentation, but I'm not sure.

The following notes I took from the website www.schoolvisitexperts.com


Presentation Length: 30 minutes

The Focus: How a nonfiction book gets published (for me, from assignment to finished product). 

The Sub-focus: How to research and put facts together to make an interesting book for readers.

Big-Picture Audience Take-Away: To learn about how a book gets published from beginning to end.

Table props to make the presentation 3-D: 

• Stack of books used for research; binders with materials (1^st drafts, writer’s guidelines, etc.
• Music -- Maybe, maybe not—not sure yet
• Possible Images for visual (power point) presentation

• Writer’s guidelines
• Screen shots of the final .pdf
• Websites used for research
• My office/workspace
• The cubicle in the library where I write sometimes

 Classroom Connection: 

• Before my visit
• Ask the teachers and/or librarian to make the books available for the kids to preview prior to the event.
• Encourage the teachers to have kids share stories, draw pictures or share photos of their favorite nonfiction topic (animals, space, nature).
• After my visit
• Invite kids to write letters, telling about their favorite part of the presentation, what tips they learned, or share a story they want to write. 
• Leave behind a bibliography of picture books – both nonfiction and fiction. 

Other ideas: 

• Create question cards that kids can choose out of a hat—brainstorm possible questions just in case they get stumped.

• Think of the presentation in the same way you approach a book:  including plot, character, conflict, dialogue.  You do not have to be a standup comedian or even a polished public speaker.  It does help tremendously if you have a “story” to tell your audience that includes information about your latest work, your total body of work, your “themes”, the struggles you encountered on your way to becoming a published author.  The audience likes to know an appropriate amount about you as a person – past as well as present. (**I feel like this is the most important takeaway from the site.) 

 WHAT TEACHERS & LIBRARIANS WANT KIDS TO LEARN:

• ·         avoid plagiarism
• ·         do research
• ·         take notes
• ·         construct a bibliography
• ·         paraphrase
• ·         distinguish a reliable source of information from an unreliable one

Thanks to the great bloggers at http://schoolvisitexperts.com for the above tips.