Sharon Holt
Author of Kōrero Māori ai au Illustrated by Claudia Gadotti Published by EduMaxi Ltd |
About the author
Sharon Holt has always loved writing and reading. As a child growing up in Auckland, she decided to become a children’s author after winning several prizes in writing competitions. However, her writing dream wasn’t fulfilled until she turned 40. “When I left school I was too young to dive straight into a writing career, so I tried teaching, then journalism,” she says. Life intervened and the dream of writing for children was forgotten until one night when Sharon was reading a pile of bedtime stories to her two young children. “I suddenly remembered that I was meant to be a children’s author!” The next morning, she started writing stories and sending them to the School Journal editors at Learning Media. Her first three stories were accepted, which gave Sharon the kick start she needed. Since then, Sharon has had her work published by educational publishers in New Zealand and Australia. She has also been successful with several trade publishers and was a finalist in the NZ Post Children’s Book Awards in 2007. Sharon is best known for her self-published series of award-winning Te Reo Singalong books. Bibliography Learning Media Short cut to School School Journal story published 2001 Move that Tree! School Journal article published 2002 No, Skipper! Ready to Read published 2002 Skipper’s Happy Tail Ready to Read published 2003 Superglue School Journal play published 2003 Remembering Summer School Journal poem published 2003 Uncle Hone’s Cloak Picture book published 2004 Off you Go, Auntie Ma! Picture book published 2004 Katie’s Birthday School Journal story published 2005 Cengage Learning Australia Josh series of books Early chapter books published 2003 - 2004 Don’t Embarrass Me, Dad! Easy chapter book for older readers 2006 The Coat Easy chapter book for older readers 2007 You can make your own Jokes Allen and Unwin 2006 Your Mother Didn’t Do That! Walker Books 2009 Sabotage (Rainbow Warrior) Scholastic My Story series 2008 No Survivors (Erebus) Scholastic My story series 2009 Te Reo Singalong series 17 titles published between 2011 and 2018, with more due out this year. |
About Kōrero Māori ai au
Kōrero Māori ai au is the 16th book in the award-winning Te Reo Singalong series. Each double page spread features a new place where te reo Māori can be spoken, as well as some vocabulary words to help speakers in that setting. The settings covered in the book include the playground, the beach, in the car, in the bush, on the marae, at the shops and at home.
Each page follows the repetitive sentence structure which translates as:
“Do you speak Māori?”
“Yes, I speak Māori at .................”
The book includes a singalong CD which puts the words in the book to music, to help children, teachers and parents to learn and remember the sentences, phrases and words.
How the idea for the book came about
The idea for this book came to me fully formed. I sometimes hear families speaking te reo at the shops and I wanted to write a book that helped families to use more Māori language in their daily lives. I hope that people who use this book will add some of these sentence structures and words to their daily conversation as they play, work, shop, relax and gather together.
The writing process
When I work on a new Te Reo Singalong book I juggle themes, sentence structures and phrases in te reo until the idea comes together. With this book I decided to create a story that focused on using te reo in lots of different places. I needed to think of 10 settings, one for each of the double page spreads.
Each setting had to be suitable for illustrations and have several potential vocabulary words. The settings I decided on were school, playground, garden, car, farm, beach, shops, bush, marae and home.
I wrote the sentence structure to be repeated on each page and asked te reo Māori expert Kristin Smith to check my work for accuracy. She came back with her suggestions and I made the changes. Because I also published this book the next thing on the list was to meet with the illustrator, Claudia Gadotti.
Claudia and I discussed the structure of the book and my ideas for the illustrations. I also told her about the specific illustrations needed on each page for the new vocabulary. After a few weeks Claudia came back to me with her sketches. I changed some aspects of the sketches and, when it was all approved Claudia began work on the full colour illustrations.
While that was happening our son Greg started working on a melody for the song. I gave him the words and the English translation and several week later he was ready to play the song to me on his guitar. We made a few tweaks to the tune and then made a draft recording of me singing the tune with Greg on guitar.
The singer on our CDs is Stacy Walker. Stacy often writes the melody for the songs as well. With this book I emailed Stacy the file containing the recording of the new song. Stacy practised it and when she was ready for recording I made an appointment with our recording engineer, Caleb Driver. He booked the studio and on the night Stacy and I met at the studio to record the song. Caleb had already recorded the instruments to accompany Stacy’s singing. This song also includes a spoken section for each page which were recorded with my voice. Later, Caleb recorded the harmonies and mixed and mastered the song.
Claudia emailed me her first few illustrations so I could check that I was happy with the colours. She continued working on the illustrations and when she was finished the project was ready to go to the designer, Jasmine Bailey.
Jasmine needed the illustration files, the words to go with the illustrations and all the other words in the book, including the wording for the covers, the information pages, the ISBN and the barcode.
After a couple of weeks, Jasmine sent me the rough design of the book. I checked all the words for correct spelling, and to make sure the macrons were in the right places. Finally, after lots of proof reading, and when I was happy with the finished design of the book, Jasmine created the final printer files.
The printer needed all the design files for the book as well as the music file for the CD. After he received the files he created a proof copy for checking. I went through the proof very carefully because it was the last chance to spot any errors. Once the proof was approved the printer went ahead with organising the printing of the books and CDs, as well as getting the CDs placed into sleeves in the back of each book.
The final process of publication was when the printer sent the books in cartons to our house. And that’s when the marketing and selling began!
Kōrero Māori ai au is the 16th book in the award-winning Te Reo Singalong series. Each double page spread features a new place where te reo Māori can be spoken, as well as some vocabulary words to help speakers in that setting. The settings covered in the book include the playground, the beach, in the car, in the bush, on the marae, at the shops and at home.
Each page follows the repetitive sentence structure which translates as:
“Do you speak Māori?”
“Yes, I speak Māori at .................”
The book includes a singalong CD which puts the words in the book to music, to help children, teachers and parents to learn and remember the sentences, phrases and words.
How the idea for the book came about
The idea for this book came to me fully formed. I sometimes hear families speaking te reo at the shops and I wanted to write a book that helped families to use more Māori language in their daily lives. I hope that people who use this book will add some of these sentence structures and words to their daily conversation as they play, work, shop, relax and gather together.
The writing process
When I work on a new Te Reo Singalong book I juggle themes, sentence structures and phrases in te reo until the idea comes together. With this book I decided to create a story that focused on using te reo in lots of different places. I needed to think of 10 settings, one for each of the double page spreads.
Each setting had to be suitable for illustrations and have several potential vocabulary words. The settings I decided on were school, playground, garden, car, farm, beach, shops, bush, marae and home.
I wrote the sentence structure to be repeated on each page and asked te reo Māori expert Kristin Smith to check my work for accuracy. She came back with her suggestions and I made the changes. Because I also published this book the next thing on the list was to meet with the illustrator, Claudia Gadotti.
Claudia and I discussed the structure of the book and my ideas for the illustrations. I also told her about the specific illustrations needed on each page for the new vocabulary. After a few weeks Claudia came back to me with her sketches. I changed some aspects of the sketches and, when it was all approved Claudia began work on the full colour illustrations.
While that was happening our son Greg started working on a melody for the song. I gave him the words and the English translation and several week later he was ready to play the song to me on his guitar. We made a few tweaks to the tune and then made a draft recording of me singing the tune with Greg on guitar.
The singer on our CDs is Stacy Walker. Stacy often writes the melody for the songs as well. With this book I emailed Stacy the file containing the recording of the new song. Stacy practised it and when she was ready for recording I made an appointment with our recording engineer, Caleb Driver. He booked the studio and on the night Stacy and I met at the studio to record the song. Caleb had already recorded the instruments to accompany Stacy’s singing. This song also includes a spoken section for each page which were recorded with my voice. Later, Caleb recorded the harmonies and mixed and mastered the song.
Claudia emailed me her first few illustrations so I could check that I was happy with the colours. She continued working on the illustrations and when she was finished the project was ready to go to the designer, Jasmine Bailey.
Jasmine needed the illustration files, the words to go with the illustrations and all the other words in the book, including the wording for the covers, the information pages, the ISBN and the barcode.
After a couple of weeks, Jasmine sent me the rough design of the book. I checked all the words for correct spelling, and to make sure the macrons were in the right places. Finally, after lots of proof reading, and when I was happy with the finished design of the book, Jasmine created the final printer files.
The printer needed all the design files for the book as well as the music file for the CD. After he received the files he created a proof copy for checking. I went through the proof very carefully because it was the last chance to spot any errors. Once the proof was approved the printer went ahead with organising the printing of the books and CDs, as well as getting the CDs placed into sleeves in the back of each book.
The final process of publication was when the printer sent the books in cartons to our house. And that’s when the marketing and selling began!