Interview with Dawn Meredith by Fran Knight
Interview with Dawn Meredith by Fran Knight
Meeting an author in a bookshop leads to all sorts of discussions
about
books and their future, and so talking to Dawn Meredith at Mary
Martin's on the Parade, Norwood, led us in quite different
directions
surrounded by the end product of the work done by people such as
she. I am grappling with all the ideas about the future of
books,
now that the digital age is here, but not so Dawn. She is adamant
that
there will always be a place for books, the tactile and intimate
awareness of the book cannot be replaced by an electronic gadget. I
am
hopeful that she is right, and looking at her blog tells me
that this belief is heartfelt, as her mission statement confirms:
her
desire is to get kids away from computers and back into reading.
Armed
with a concern such as this cannot be easy when faced with the array
of
computers and electronic devices now attached to modern kids, but
she
espouses the view that while these are necessary they need to be
tempered in their use.
A special eduction teacher, Dawn is now training to be a counsellor,
as
she feels that much of her work with remediation of kids' learning
is
dependent upon counselling. Between writing and studying, she works
at
a writers' centre and offers writing workshops herself, while
working
at the Springwood Children's Learning Centre. Through these she sees
the end result of kids who have lost their way with reading and so
spends a lot of time teaching reading and writing. This is reflected
in
the workshops she has taken while in South Australia with schools at
Victor Harbor and in Adelaide. A gig at Victor Harbor Primary School
saw her workshopping 23 classes during the week, and her open door
policy at lunch time meant that many more children were able to
spend
time on a one to one basis, sharing their writing and ideas.
Dawn has had a number of books published, some in the wonderful
Livewires Real Lives series, telling the stories of some of
our
foremost citizens in an easy to read, direct style suitable for
those
readers who find reading more difficult. These include those by
Dawn,
Sir Donald Bradman and Tony Lockett, and although out
of
print, are
likely to be reprinted soon, so popular is this series. Pearson
Education has also published The Wobbly Wombat, by Dawn and
several
other books in the successful Blueprint series by Pearson, feature
her
work. The Wobbly Wombat is about bullying and the way to
overcome it,
as wombat, small for his age and a little wobbly on his short legs
is
derided by others. He retreats to the forest where he meets a
variety
of animals who tell him how to overcome the intimidation he
receives.
Their sage advice helps him achieve this, and in a smart resolution
learns that he has friends. Her story, The Anything Shop is
soon to be
released by Wombat, a relative newcomer to the publishing industry
in
Australia.
Her two books in the Livewires Real Lives series espouses
another of
her missions, that of creating books for boys. She believes that
many
boys do not have a significant male in their families to mentor
their
reading and so it is important for boys to be targeted in schools. A
display which caught her eye at one Adelaide school, had an array of
photos of the male staff reading, a promotion by the library to
encourage boys into its doors (scroll down to June 16 on her
blog for more
information. )
Armed with such resolve to encourage boys reading and focus her
books
on the needs of those within the school community to overcome
bullying,
there will be more books on the shelves by Dawn Meredith, so watch
out
for them.
Dawn has been in South Australia as a recipient of the May Gibbs
Fellowship, allowing her to stay in an apartment at Norwood for a
month
to enable her to write. This venture has seen a number of authors
who
are now well known staying in South Australia. Past recipients
include
Shaun Tan, Karen Tayleur, Lorraine Marwood and John Nicholson.
More about the May Gibbs Fellowship can be found here.
While in South Australia, Dawn has been working on several projects
for
publishers and we wish her well.
28/6/11