Creating Picture Books

Enhance your students’ literacy through Creating Picture Books

This tailored workshop encourages students to experiment with their own creative writing to create stories they can share with their families and friends. Creating Picture Books is suitable for a range of primary and secondary school year levels and is a means of starting the process of creating a picture book.

Prep to Year 2: Learning about beginnings, middles and endings

Students in this age group discuss story ideas, plan their drawings and work towards creating a story with a beginning, a middle and an end. Using familiar texts, students look at how characters’ motivations can influence their stories.

Years 3 & 4: Using humour to convey character

Students in Years 3 and 4 also work on character motivation, story structure and illustrations, with the added theme of using humour as a way to convey character. Familiar texts are used to identify what makes some stories funny and others not.

Years 5 & 6: Non-fiction picture books to demonstrate knowledge

Students in Years 5 and 6 being the process of creating a nonfiction picture book for a younger audience, usually in Prep to Year 2. The students usually choose topics within the school’s learning areas of Science, Technologies, Humanities, Maths, The Arts, English or Languages, but teachers may allow different topics according to student needs.
The workshop focuses on how to plan a nonfiction text and sourcing illustrations and images, with an emphasis on helping younger readers understand the topic.

Years 7 to 12: Tailored creative writing workshops

I work with English teachers to create tailored creative writing workshops that meet individual class requirements. These workshops include the concepts of creating engaging characters, sourcing images and holding the reader’s attention. They may also look at aspects of the editing process and how the publishing industry works, according to school needs.

Why engage me?

I’m an industry professional who knows how to connect with students and meet their literacy needs. I also love writing and reviewing picture books and have reviewed them for Magpies Magazine for over 7 years.My workshops are aimed squarely at enhancing your students’ literacy skills…but they will also create picture books that they and their families will cherish.
…And you’ll be able to enjoy the process, knowing that your curriculum goals will be met and your budget well spent.

Marie Alafaci | Author | Hugging her book Zelda's Big Adventure

Ready to work with me on meeting your students’ literacy learning needs?

Enquire now

I recently worked on a client’s project where the website copywriting needed to be exceptional. The website content was technical and the site aimed at people working within the industry. This meant the copywriting required further understanding and research for it to be accurate and resonate with potential website visitors. Marie has a meticulous approach to gathering information in order to write meaningful and interesting copy. Marie spoke with my client directly to obtain a full understanding of the technicalities of the services he provides to his clients. The website is now ‘live’. The copy and design complement each other perfectly and both my client and I are very happy with the outcome. I highly recommend Marie and her copywriting services.

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Neil Forrester | Ethos Website Design

Marie is a master at writing material that’s easy to read and suits the intended audience. She’s shared her expertise to help me improve my website copy. Whenever I need to get my messaging right, I don’t hesitate to seek Marie’s expert views on my content. I value her constructive and kind feedback to help polish up my writing.
As writers, we can feel emotionally attached to our work and Marie is respectful of that. She’s generous and funny, it’s been a joy working together.

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Jenny Lindsay | ConnectJen

“Marie is fantastic at what she does and is clearly a very a talented writer. She is so easy to communicate with and her feedback has been invaluable. Highly recommend any business to reach out to her and utilise her skill set!”

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Melanie Longano | Northern Allied Health

When I needed some articles and recipes presented professionally, I called on Marie for help. She was efficient, professional and easy to work with. Her recommendations were spot on and I’m so glad I reached out to her and got the job done properly. I will be using Marie for more work in the next few weeks and months, it’s so nice knowing that my ideas and thoughts and recipes will be given the once over. I am at the stage where I just don’t have the time to do it myself, and having Marie’s amazing skill-set means I can be confident that she is going to find all my little errors and typos. Couldn’t recommend her services enough, my only problem is I wish I had engaged her sooner!

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Chef Mel | Vanilla Zulu

“Great course. Marie is fantastic and I loved her passion for all things grammar!”

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D.T . Workshop participant , VIC

“Marie has been a regular guest to our College, and for good reason. As an expert, she leads our students in writer’s workshops, sharing her experience and wisdom in how to write creatively for a specific audience. Marie tailors her workshop to our needs and brings a wealth of knowledge that is presented in a fun and engaging way. Within minutes she builds a great rapport with students and it’s always a great session. Thanks, Marie!”

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Olivia Allen | Overnewton Anglican Community College

“The Grammar & Punctuation course was a brilliant refresher. The facilitator managed the groups exceedingly well, and was approachable, pleasant and engaging.”

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A.B. Workshop participant , VIC

“I loved the motivation that Marie gave. I found her instruction easy to follow and enjoyed the tasks she gave us.”

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L.G. Workshop participant, VIC

“I liked the lunchtime writing and observing task and the class involvement.”

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P.P. Workshop participant, VIC

“Brilliant pitch techniques.”

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R.A. Workshop participant, VIC

“Marie was very knowledgeable and engaging.”

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G.W. Workshop participant, VIC

“Marie was knowledgeable and provided good examples. The material was delivered clearly and systematically”

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T.B. Workshop participant, VIC

“Marie was friendly and flexible in (her) approach to teaching, welcoming questions and supplementing discussion.”

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G.K. Workshop participant, VIC

“Marie was an excellent facilitator. Made difficult concepts interesting and easy to understand. Also handled difficult students well.”

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P.P. Workshop participant, VIC

“Engaging presenter who knows her topic well! Bravo!”

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R.L. Workshop participant, VIC

“The instructor, Marie, did not dwell on the technical definitions and explained with examples. She continuously asked logical questions making it easier to remember what a verb, pronoun etc are.”

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M.L. Workshop participant, VIC

“The content was well delivered and easy to follow.”

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T.R. Workshop participant, VIC

“The content of the course was very useful and dealt with common issues.”

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M.F. Workshop participant, VIC

“The pace was good and the tone of the room very non-judgemental.”

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V.F. Workshop participant, VIC

“Thank you so much for today, it was fantastic! The students have already said it was the highlight of the High Ability Master Class.”

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Fabiano Nigro | Macleod College

“I worked with Marie in 2020 to set up and run the Grammar and Punctuation online Short Course at RMIT University. She was very professional, easy to work with, and a great communicator. I had to dedicate a lot of time to train other teachers to use the collaborate ultra and canvas technology but Marie was already proficient with it and even taught me new tricks. I understand why the students loved the Grammar and Punctuation course so much; she is a very passionate expert in her field, patient and generous with her time.”

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Frances Devlin | RMIT University

“As a teacher Marie Alafaci excels. She taught with us for three years across a broad range of subjects, including fiction, nonfiction, industry overview and writing for children. She connects with her students on a personal level and cares deeply about what she does. Marie is always friendly, reliable, professional and trustworthy, and I would recommend her to anyone looking to develop or improve their writing skills.”

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Tracey Rolfe | Victoria University Polytechnic

“Marie evaluated a draft of my novel. She gave detailed feedback on the plot, structure and language. Her analysis provided insights that I would never have gained on my own and she made many excellent suggestions to improve the manuscript. Her comments struck a perfect balance between affirming what was good in the work and opening up ways for me to improve. The benefits to me have been incalculable.”

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D.K. Fantasy writer, VIC.

“Thank you Marie for being a part of our High Ability Masterclass! It was such a pleasure hearing about your career and getting the hints about writing.”

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Fabiano Nigro | Macleod College

“I thoroughly enjoyed (the workshop) and am keen to use what I’ve learnt in my writing. I’m also more confident to write after the session.”

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N.G. Workshop participant, VIC

“I was able to take away a number of useful ideas that I know will assist me in my writing.”

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S.G. Workshop participant, VIC

“Marie Alafaci’s creative writing clinic provided exciting strategies to assist writers. She is a knowledgeable professional writer whose thorough preparation resulted in a brilliant clinic. The venue, Ivanhoe Library, is excellent, and Marie Alafaci is well equipped, so the sessions were stimulating.”

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M.L. Workshop participant, VIC

“The creative writing clinic contained a great mix of tapping into sources of inspiration for writing content and practical advice for getting the words down then refining them.”

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C.M. Workshop participant, VIC

“(The workshop was) an excellent mix of background and addressing participants’ questions.”

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C.M. Workshop participant, VIC

“Marie Alafaci covered many relevant aspects of the writers’ craft, relevant to both fiction and non-fiction. I hope to apply some of her crafting strategies to refine my children’s novellas.”

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M.L. Workshop participant, VIC

“It was a privilege to be taught by Marie during my time at VU, studying Professional Writing and Editing. Her passion for writing and teaching sparked many lively conversations. Marie encouraged all of us to strive towards a higher level of writing as well as being adventurous in the choices we made. Marie’s style of teaching drew me in: for her attention to the techniques of writing and her motivational mode in conveying the art of writing. Her years of multi-faceted experience has been a source of inspiration to me, and I am grateful for the invaluable impact she has made on my writing habits and skills.”

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Gina Edwards

“Marie leads an amazing writing workshop. I feel like I have learnt so much during this workshop and it is the highlight of my month.”

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I.L. Workshop participant, VIC

“Fabulous to get feedback on my writing and direction on how to improve my ideas for future writing.”

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T.L. Workshop participant, VIC

“These sessions are so valuable – the feeback and discussions are always helpful and encouraging.’

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H.B. Workshop participant, VIC

“A superb session with a written exercise and great feedback on our own written pieces. It helps us so much to improve our writing styles.”

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P.G. Workshop participant, VIC

“Very welcoming and engaging session. Looking forward to more!”

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M.R. Workshop participant, VIC

“I really appreciiated the structure of the session, taking turns to give feedback rather than having a free-for-all. This is a great opportunity to get feedback on writing and I will ldefinitely be coming back next month! Very supportive group atmosphere.”

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J.B. Workshop participant, VIC

“I recently engaged Marie Alafaci to write content for my new website. She was very efficient, professional and easy to work with and cares deeply about what she does. I would recommend her for any copywriting task that requires attention to detail and creative flair.

Thank you again Marie. I look forward to working together for future works.”

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Jonathon Fox | Fox Management Group