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Shirley Parenteau

SPEAKING PAST THE BUTTERFLIES

As you know, fear of public speaking ranks number one among most people. If you are one of them, read on.

The first time I spoke to a crowded classroom, my audience was a group of fifth graders. I walked about the room, emphasizing key points and showing pictures from my book. My voice didn’t quite break. My hands didn’t quite shake. I thought I faked it pretty well.

Soon afterward, I received an envelope filled with thank you notes, all very nice, all very similar. Except for the note from one boy who added a postscript. “Next time you come to our class, you won’t have to be so nervous.”

Busted!

It would have been funny, if not for the embarrassment.

With practice, I learned to enjoy talking about writing to groups of children and even to large assemblies, though my comfort level dropped in direct proportion to the number of adults who sat in.

Now that I’m writing for children again, I’m finding promotion even more important. Readers have a lot of demands on their time, not to mention the competition each book faces from a host of others. So I’m paying close attention to the ways other writers present themselves and their material in talks and at book signings. Clearly, the key to overcoming the demon of jittery nerves is to take the focus from yourself.

Here are some ideas to consider if, like me, you are more comfortable behind your keyboard than before an audience. You may find them helpful whether you are discussing your own book or volunteering to read to children in schools or libraries.

Some authors rely on attention catching props. They suspend vibrant helium-filled balloons from the desk or podium where they stand. Others choose costumes.

At a recent bookstore signing, Karen Newcomb made a clever frog hat by gluing foam ball “eyes” to a green-dyed cap. To her dismay, she found the cap worried very young readers. A lot of children are frightened by adults in costume, whether as Santa Claus, a chicken at the State Fair or even in a frog hat and green tee shirt. It’s something to keep in mind.

A writer whose nonfiction book for young readers revolves around Colonial times greets her audiences in Colonial costume and rivets attention by displaying a dried buffalo chip. She may have a problem, she confided recently, since the chip is crumbling and she hasn’t had much luck in locating a replacement.

Other writers bring stuffed animals to represent characters in their books. Recently, I watched children at a bookstore become enchanted by an author’s collection of musical instruments from exotic cultures. Her book describes the travels of early Chinese explorers. The instruments represent the countries visited.

The children loved upending the rain stick, a length of hollow cactus, and listening to the soft “rainfall” of seeds sealed inside filtering to the bottom. A small drum, a colorful flute and a simple marimba were also taken up eagerly by the visiting children.

I don’t know if speaking comes as easily to this writer as she made it look. I do know that when you’ve caught the attention of an audience, it’s easier to speak naturally and confidently with them.

Among the most enthusiastic self-promoters of the writers I’ve met is an author of electronic books. Because her first e-book was a YA mystery with a boat playing a large part, she gave her audience simple instructions for folding an origami boat. She made sure her name, book title and ordering information were on each sheet. These are still popular giveaways for her when placed on promotional tables at conferences.

One picture book writer offers simple connect-the-dot sketches as giveaways to draw children to her display at signings. This idea could be adapted to any picture book. What is your subject? Can you draw a simple outline and substitute numbered dots for the lines? The internet offers an enormous variety of clip art in the public domain. Try asking a search engine to find, for example, “truck illustration.”

You can use the same method to find pictures to enlarge and print for children to take home and color.

Be careful of copying or scanning an illustration from your own or any other copyrighted book unless you have permission from the artist and the publisher.

I ran a search for “origami frog” and found easy directions for folding a square of paper to make a somewhat ungainly frog that hops when pushed on one end. In green paper with stick-on eyes, it’s going to be a child pleasing takeaway.

Several years ago, I sold a picture book about a boy who became separated from his father in a large grocery store. Later I’ll Bet You Thought I Was Lost was used with several other stories in a children’s activity book by the same publisher. One of the activities, a maze, showed an overview of the aisles through a grocery store. The child reader was to take Sandy through the maze to find his father at the far end.

My counting book One Frog Sang begins with one big frog leaping to the top of a high garden wall. I’m working on a maze where the young reader can help the frog find his way past areas pictured in the book to reach the high garden wall. Consider your own book. Can you draw a maze to illustrate the story?

As I write this, I have just discovered an online educational publisher offering a hand puppet that looks like the frog on my cover. The company is selling the puppet separately or in combination with One Frog Sang. I no sooner ordered one to use with future book signings and readings than my daughter found the same puppet in an eBay store for a lower price.

But it brings to mind another possibility for all of us. Many varieties of hand puppets can be found in toy stores and online. Consider one resembling characters from your book, whether bears, dragons, princesses or nearly anything else. Children love visuals and it gives us, as speaker, something to do with our hands!

Talking to groups of children gets easier and more fun each time you do it. Try not to get nervous if adults sit in. They will, because they’re interested in how you write. Many of them wish to write, themselves.

You’re there for the children. Ignore the adults. You are no longer (your name here) who lives down the street and usually gets her trash can in before the homeowner’s association issues a warning. You are (your name here in sparkly caps) the author who is sharing her passion for writing with these eager children. The adults are nothing but backdrop. During this talk, they don’t matter.

Say it with me: The adults don’t matter.

Now go out there and have fun sharing your pleasure in writing with the young readers who love your books.