Mike loves doing author events in schools, book festivals or community settings. Typical events linking with his books look and feel like this:

Nursery, P1-P3 (age bandings listed under each heading are suggestions and not fixed)

The Giant Who Snored
The town’s friendly giant is causing chaos with his snoring – who can wake him up – and how? Find out in an interactive session including two catchy songs (one upbeat, one sleepy), fun with rhymes and tongue-twisters, a suitcase of crazy props to wake up a snorer and the world’s only ‘Snore-ometer’. This session always gets children guessing, rhyming and singing.

My Granny Went to Scotland and she brought back…
This session is a giant guessing game packed with singing, word clues, and gradually revealing Granny’s memorable gifts. This session gets children thinking about all things Scottish, testing their brains with a memory game and learning new descriptive words.

Thistle Street
How much fun can you have by taking simple words and rhyming with them? LOADS! Thistle Street introduces Scots words through rhyme and its residents’ everyday activities. Perfect for St. Andrew’s Day, Burns Night or Scots Week activities. Children love learning how to say, and when to use words like dreich, blether, clarty, drookit, stramash and bahookie!

“Mike visited our pre-school with ‘The Giant Who Snored’. The children loved his input as he involved them in several ways. In the 40 minute session he not only read his book but managed to include drama, rhyming games, two lovely songs, a snore classifying task, and most fun of all a case full of ideas of how to stop a snorer! The pitch was perfect for our age range and I would strongly recommend other nurseries to invite him along!”

– Kyra Okoth, Teacher/Manager, Greenbank Pre School, Edinburgh

P5-7
Hotel Grimm
This middle grade novel provides a way to look at where authors get ideas from, how to write engaging openings and how language and senses can be used to develop character and setting. It also provides an opportunity to talk about assumptions and prejudice and to consider ‘fake news’, considering the bigger picture in a given situation.

Catscape
This middle grade novel provides a way to look at where authors get their ideas from, and explore how simple local settings and activities can be used to inspire stories – including giving groups the opportunity to create their own story idea together. The session can also be used to explore generating story ideas across multiple genres.