At the festival of cultures in Fürstenfeldbruck in Germany, the association Turmgeflüster set up a mobile writing workshop. The book “Stories As Colourful as the World” was created in just one afternoon! Children and youths could come to the event and spontaneously draw and write one page of the picture book. In total, eleven children and youths participated. The youngest, Elea, was only three years old. She designed the title page. Where would you set up a mobile writing workshop?

The joint community Gellersen in Germany made some very special christmas gifts this year. For each of the 46 children living in refugee accomodations in Gellersen, the community printed the bilingual picture book "The Glass Ring". First they chose one of the stories on www.bilingual-picturebooks.org. Next they downloaded the book in German and Arabic, Farsi, Spanish, Ukranian, Russian, or Englisch, the childrens' native languages. Finally, they printed the books in an A4 format. The integration commissioner Britta Müller explained: „In school and kindergarten the children learn German much more quickly than their parents. The families can read the bilingual picture books together." Steffen Gärtner, the Mayor, added: "We want to bring the children some joy for christmas and at the same time increase solidarity in the family and build bridges."

In the picture you can see: Mayor Steffen Gärtner (right), integration commisioner Britta Müller (2nd f. r.) and Holger Schölzel (left) giving Mohana (10) from Iran and her parents the bilingual picture book wrapped in paper and some chocolate.

How does the future actually come about? The sustainable development goals are a vision of how we would like to live in the future created by 193 different countries . Children in Serbia have also been pondering this question. You can see their results in the picture above. In our book "How does the future actually come about?" we have collected questions asked by children from all over the world about the future and the sustainable development goals. With these questions and the pictures from the book school children in Pozega in Serbia created a presentation right on their market square. On different boards visitors were invited to read the questions from the book and the sustainable development goal they belong to. Additionally, the children drew their own paintings for the pages. You can see our favorite page on the board in the picture above. The question on this page is: Where do the words in my head come from?

A Kamishibai is a frame made of wood which can open to reveal what is inside. It comes from Japan. The name can be traslated as papertheatre, Kami meaning paper and Mishibai meaning theatre. A Kamishibai is a great way to read picturebooks with groups of children. Simply put the Illustration into the Kamishibai and then read the text of the page aloud, then switch pictures and turn to the next page. Of course this is also possible with the picturebooks on www.bilingual-picturebooks.org. You can simply print out the pictures of one of our books and place them into the Kamishibai. Haave fun making your own papertheatre!