Anne Fine deplores 'gritty realism' of modern children's books
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- Published: Tuesday, 25 August 2009 10:08
Former Children's Laureate Anne Fine said that modern stories offered little hope for their protagonists
(Colin Hattersley)
A new system for reading music
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- Published: Wednesday, 24 June 2009 11:54
Every Good Boy Deserves Failure. And All Cows End Gorily - or is it Eat Grass? Generations of children have struggled over mnemonics designed to help them translate five black lines and a series of dots into music. Some accomplish this feat; some - like me - remember little except these disjointed sentences. But that could soon be history, according to a charity that's introducing a music notation system to the UK from Finland that is accessible enough for the youngest children to understand. "A revolution in music education is under way," says Brian Cope, of Drake Music Scotland.
Scottish designer's art for windows
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- Published: Wednesday, 24 June 2009 11:26
As a child, Sarah Campbell spent her summer holidays on the Isle of Lismore. On walks, she and her artist mother would pick tufts of sheep's wool from the barbed wire fences and take it home. There they would wash, card and spin it, turn it into fabric on a loom and dye it.
Now working as a designer, Sarah has woven those childhood lessons into the one-off "textile paintings" doubling as window blinds that she creates in her workshop on the tiny island which sits under the mountains of Morvern in the Firth of Lorne for her company Mogwaii Design.