I had the joy of visiting my old stomping ground, Helmwood Heights Elementary School (in Elizabethtown, KY) today. It is "I Love To Read" week at Helmwood and I was invited to read one of my stories to Leah Gardner and Liz Looten's second grade classes.  

I was an instructional assistant at Helmwood from September 1999-May 2012 working in different years with first grade up to fifth.  Many of my co-workers are still there so it's always fun to see everyone especially since they are still there working hard, noses to the grindstone but I'm now just breezing through for a short visit!  

The students and staff were all dressed as their favorite storybook characters so not to be outdone, I brought my favorite hat for Cat In The Hat.  But not just any Cat In The Hat.  My hat was blue and white so I was the UK Cat In The Hat (for the uninformed, that's the University of Kentucky Wildcats----GO BIG BLUE!!) The second graders figured it out immediately. "You're the UK Cat In The Hat!!" (You have to live in Kentucky to understand the fever pitch and obsession of college basketball!)

Since we're technically still in the winter season (even though Mother Nature has been giving all of our snow to Boston), I chose to read a story from The Peacock Writers' last winter book, Snowflakes On My Lashes.  The story is called The Ice Surfing King and is about Robert and his brothers and their favorite pastime. But if you haven't yet read the story, there's something a little different about Robert and his siblings.  I'll let you find out on your own. :-)

A big thank you to teachers Leah Gardner, Liz Looten, and instructional assistant Kendra Walker for letting me take up your class time and share with the students.  
I hope to return sometime soon!

If you are one of the students reading this, I hope you enjoyed it as well.  Don't forget, Snowflakes On My Lashes is now in your library! Check it out!

Lenora Rodgers

Lenora Rodgers gives back through the stories she tells
Wednesday's Woman
By Becca Owsley
Tuesday, October 28, 2014






Author Lenora Rodgers uses her love of writing to help support organizations in the community.

She said she was an “Army brat’ and an only child. The family moved around a lot during her father’s career in the military and she remembers writing a lot during that time but never did anything with it.

When she worked for the federal government for 25 years, she said didn’t have much time for writing, especially raising two kids at that time.

She took early retirement but knew she still wanted to do something. Rodgers became an instructional assistant at Helmwood Elementary School for 13 years. During that time, she started writing again. She worked with first and second graders and saw how excited the kids were when they found a good book.

“There’s nothing more exciting to see a child who absolutely won’t read because they just don’t like it and then find a subject they like and want to read it,” Rodgers said.

After retiring from working at the school, Rodgers took the opportunity to do something with her writing.

She found a group of writers on an eBook publishing site www.bookrix.com. On that site, she found a community of authors that talked to each other, offered feedback and helped edit each others work called the Peacock Writers. The children’s book club creates two compilation books a year and the proceeds go to children’s charities.

The writers in the group are from all over the world. They get together twice a year online to come up with the theme and content for their books, she said. To maintain control of the books and where the proceeds go, the group remains a self-published group.

Rodgers, 58, posted a Christmas poem about a little girl who saw magical things in Santa’s beard. Someone suggested she submit it for one of the group’s books, but that edition was already ready to publish. She was encouraged to come up with a story for the spring edition about fairies and dragons.

She woke up at 2 a.m. with an idea for a story about two goofy assistants to the tooth fairy, she said. One carried the bag of teeth and the other the money left for children.

She wrote it down immediately so she wouldn’t forget it and this story was in her first to be used in the Peacock Group publications.

“It’s a good way for me to be useful in my retirement and give back,” Rodgers said.

By selling these books throughout the area, she has been able to give to SpringHaven Domestic Violence Program, Memorial United Methodist’s day care and the backpack program at Feeding America, Kentucky’s Heartland. She hopes after the next round of sales to donate to New Beginnings Family Services.

She’s worked on four books with the Peacock group and usually has a short story and a piece of poetry in each one. One last year was about bullying and is designed to help kids combat bullying. The upcoming summer edition will have a beach theme and another winter edition is scheduled to come out later in the year.

Read story in entirety at The News-Enterprise
Serving Hardin County Kentucky

http://www.thenewsenterprise.com/content/lenora-rodgers-gives-back-through-stories-she-tells

 
Carolyn Tody, one of our original founding Peacock Writers authors  is our wrap up profile for the series on our 6th book, Springtime Bullies.  In her words ~ 

My favorite place in the virtual world is the Patchwork Forest, a place where anything can happen, and a tip of the hat to scenic woods surrounding my childhood home. As a child, I created tales to perform skits with my cousins. This imagination later led to a university degree and writing speculative fiction, poetry, creative non-fiction, blogging, and illustrating stories that address the question: What do we do with our unmet dreams? Do we fight for them or let them go?

I wrote Hijinks at the Peacock Palace to expand the concept of bullying. Making youngsters aware of behavior control nuances in advance could help them with emotional attentiveness to their physical surroundings. For instance, when my family moved to the country halfway through first grade, smart new kids weren’t picked for teams or included in secrets. The situation was stifling. Tightknit groups were impenetrable. Parks and playgrounds became dangerous. Escaping childhood aggressors meant keeping the mind open and knowing a way out. Despite misery, I never thought of isolation as bullying until writing this story led me to an online bullying site. Hijinks is set on the peachick playground because my teenage granddaughter finds the palace an intriguing place to expose a hidden bully… one that no one thinks of as a bully, the troll lying wait in a dark corner to catch vulnerable children off guard. This can also be the realm of our inner child. This tyrannical ‘Guardian of the Fringe’ arrives in the guise of an ally that children are otherwise positioned to embrace. ‘Haze’ represents intentional or unintentional manipulative guile, which is infinitely confusing and difficult for a child to resolve.

I love writing with the Peacock Writers. They are a warm group donating all proceeds to children’s charity. Various themes for each edition encourage my thoughts to soar in new directions. Best of all, this has given rise to the Brambleberry Lane series. These stories feature Ginger, an exotic ‘tween creature born to live in wild comfort. Across from her aging Witherworm Villa is the Patchwork Forest, a large urban park where Ginger and her friends get in and out of scrapes and lock their nightmares safely away in her sketchbook, which is morphing the series into chapter books. Life is a hand dealt each of us, a full existence blessed with unlimited potential, with gratitude to unlock positive thinking, and with stressors that create learning opportunities needed to fulfill our callings, purposes, and dreams. My goal is to create interactive content that stirs the soul. www.facebook.com/Carolyn.Tody.Author

 

 

The Eight in our series spotlighting authors who have contributed to our current collection.  Our collection, this time around is Springtime Bullies.


Peacock Writers donate their time and stories willingly to benefit charity. A different theme is picked each time and authors invited to join in. Robynn talks about her reasons for doing this.

Growing up in a parochial school, I experienced bullying first hand. I remember wondering how even though we were taught to love one another, obviously the bullies weren't paying much attention to the lessons. 

During raising five children, I faced the issue again when they would come home with stories of bullies they encountered. I had to come up with some sort of direction with them, so I taught them to respect and love, even a bully. 

But then the sixteen grandkids came along and I found that I had a bully amongst them. By then, after the last child had left home, I was finally able to do something I had longed to do for years, write. Many times I was asked for stories from the grandkids, so I started incorporating their personal traits into stories that would help them with their particular problem. 

When Peacock Writers started thinking about a book on bullies, I realized  my story on a grandchild who had to learn a lesson about not being a bully, would fit in well. 

Our children learn so much in the growing up years and stories are a great way to impress little minds. I feel very honored to have been included with such great writers as my cohorts.  .

  

The Seventh in our series spotlighting authors who have contributed to our current collection.  Our collection, this time around is Springtime Bullies.

Peacock Writers donate their time and stories willingly to benefit charity. A different theme is picked each time and authors invited to join in.Carol Murphy Napoli talks about her reasons for doing this.

Carol - I was a school librarian and teacher who saw a lot of kids bullied and it broke my heart. 

As a child, I was too, before the word "bully" was every used. By writing my story, I wanted children to know that they are not alone, and can always talk to an adult.

Sometimes, things are too hard to handle by themselves. I merely want to teach others to live by the Golden Rule: "Do unto others as you would want them to do unto you."

Here are my reasons for writing about bullying.

Hi, my name is Alan and I have made a name for myself as a ghost story writer, although I don't like to be classed as a genre-writer because I write in various styles. My best seller is my new Sci-Fi series on B&N called "Forgestriker."

Another string to my bow is the recently released romantic ghost story “A Sailor’s Love” which mixes tones of “The Flying Dutchman,” “Peter Grimes” and “Wuthering Heights.” https://www.draft2digital.com/book/34522 . My latest book is being reviewed for the same award as “Chronicles of Mark Johnson” received two years ago.

Before I get personal, the main reason I wrote my story the way I did, was to show people who get bullied that they are the ones with the strength of character, which is why they get bullied. This didn't occur to me, until some friends pointed out why I came under cyber-attack for several months on one site.

Yes, bullying happens at any age -- I am in my mid-50s -- the people who bullied me used various tactics, some would attack my work, others openly attacked me on line, some dropped hints, and one so cowardly he attacked me, anomously.

 The end result was these attacks scared me so much, I was afraid to go on line and almost quit writing, which was their aim. It wasn't until I left the site that I realised the truth. I am better than them and that scared them.

Until a few years ago I lived with the threat of bullying at home. I was the victim of more than one attack from my stepson. A disabled man makes an easy target for a man half his age. This problem was caused by my stepson being a drug addict/heavy drinker.

Understanding the reason why behind a bully's action will help in stopping the unacceptable behavior.  

Alan is the chap on his feet ready to spring into action whether it be penning a new story, doing a reading, or advertising not only his own stories but those around him.