Tina M. Cho's Blog, page 7

The 12 Days of Christmas in Kentucky

I love picture books, especially Christmas ones! My friend, Evelyn Christensen and her debut picture book, The Twelves Days of Christmas in Kentucky are at the grog blog today. Join me to see how Ev landed this contract.

Author Skypes

Wanna know more about conducting author Skypes? Read about it at the Grog blog where I interview picture book author, Laura Murray, of the Gingerbread Man Loose in the School series. She recently Skyped with my students. It was fabulous! 

Also, don't forget November is picture book month! Each day a picture book author shares their thoughts at the Picture Book Month web site!

Back to School Themes in Picture Books

Since I am teaching kindergarten this year, I'm in the trenches of back to school picture books. Some picture books correlate nicely with a theme in which the teacher can use the picture book to support the classroom theme. 

​For example, I am using a pirate theme. There are soooo many pirate picture books out there. Sadly, I don't have that many, but what I do have, I'm excited to share because it goes perfectly with my theme. I found this image below on Pinterest.
My fun "assignment" for you is to think of a great classroom decorating theme and go write a picture book that a teacher could use with that theme. For example, I recently saw Planet Kindergarten (haven't read it yet), but that might be fun to decorate with a space theme. If you research "Kindergarten" or "back to school books," check out what themes have been used. Create your own. I don't want to be doing pirates forever!

Translation: A Necessity for Children's Literature

I'm at the Grog Blog today talking about translation in children's books. I learned so much from a session I observed.
groggorg.blogspot.kr/2016/09/translation-necessity-for-childrens.html

Back to School with Kinder Pirates

Ahoy, Mates!
I set sail for Pyeongtaek, South Korea, in a new school, teaching my favorite grade--kindergarten! As you can tell from the picture and title, my decorating theme is pirates. Since then I've noticed a plethora of pirate picture books + International Talk Like a Pirate Day on September 19th!

Our first reading unit theme is nursery rhymes. Lo and behold, my friend, Nancy I. Sanders, wrote ​A Pirate's Mother Goose, which I'll read to them after they learn the originals. 

It's so fun to teach these little ones to become readers and writers. 
Speaking of writing--try brainstorming a fresh hook or premise for a pirate children's book. I will try, too. 

Have You Updated?

Pretty pink trees in Korea--anyone know what these are? Happy summer! Now that school's out, I'm FREE to write! Bring it on! 

Actually I'm wanting to do some work-for-hire like I used to do as well as work on my own manuscripts. So I prayed for work to come in. And it did! One client is a repeat client, Tuttle Singapore. But a new client, Oxford University Press, contacted me this week, wanting me to write for their educational books. She's based out of Hong Kong. I asked her how she found me. Her answer--my profile on the SCBWI website! She was/is looking for Asian writers for a specific cultural project. And then I thought--oh no, have I even updated my profile? What does it show? So this past week I updated that, plus my profile on Linked In which was long overdue. 

So the bottom line is--make sure all your profiles and web pages are updated because you never know how you'll land a writing contract! 

And if you happen to be a Malaysian freelance writer, she's looking for one. Let me know, and I can connect you! 

What Makes a Book Award Worthy?

Me, Emily Lim, award-winning author, and Leonard Marcus, industry professional & historian from the AFCC in Singapore I'm at the Grog blog today discussing What Makes a Book Award Worthy, a session I took at the AFCC in Singapore. Find out what industry professionals said!

The Asian Festival of Children's Content 2016

If you want to know more about the AFCC and the sessions I took, follow me to the Grog blog! 

My First Writing Conference Nitty Gritty

 Believe it or not, my first writing conference happened a world away in Singapore! The annual Asian Festival of Children's Content celebrates books by Asian authors or children's books with an Asian setting. I left my apt in Korea at 4:30 a.m., took a bus to the Korean airport for my 9:00 a.m. flight, arrived in Singapore around 2:00 p.m in time for the Scholastic Asian Book Awards ceremony at 7:00 p.m.

It all started the summer of 2015 when I took Nancy I. Sanders' online course Write a Middle Grade Novel in 1 Month. I had a picture book story that some of my peeps and agents suggested trying as a novel. So I did. I wrote it in May 2015, sent it out to beta readers, and revised in July/August. My critique partner Carrie Finison and the Sub It Club Facebook group told me about the Scholastic Asian Book Award deadline of September 1st, in which an author of Asian descent living in Asia who has a book set in Asia could apply. So for fun, I submitted, dreaming of flying to Singapore the next May. 

Sometimes dreams come true! In April, the conference organizer emailed saying my manuscript Chasing Freedoms: The Asian Underground Railroad was shortlisted along with four other contestants out of 50-60 submissions (can't remember the exact number). Soon I saw my photo and synopsis that I had composed as an exercise from Cheryl Klein's Second Sight on their website, newsletters, and even the Singapore Times Newspaper! 

Chasing Freedom: The Asian Underground Railroad (Author: Tina Cho, South Korea) Two unhappy kids. Two stories that lead to separate escapes across the North Korean border to China. Brokers, a pastor, and other people help Yunho and Joo Ri escape to freedom along the Asian Underground Railroad through China, Laos, Thailand, and eventually to America. Soldiers, child slavery, fake IDs, jail time, and trekking through jungles are difficulties they must face. Will they be caught and repatriated back to North Korea and sent to brutal concentration camps? In the worse moments, Yunho and Joo Ri come to terms with their past, their fears, and face the enemy head on.

Thankfully God worked out all the details so I could attend. I'm thankful to my job and husband who allowed me to go. 
One thing I love about Singapore is that people speak English. It was so refreshing to order at Subway at the airport, and the clerk understood me. A funny thing about getting a taxi is I followed the driver to the car, and he opened the right side front door. I thought he was being a gentleman, and I almost climbed in. Except he climbed in first! Singaporeans drive on the opposite side (rt side) unlike Americans and Koreans. Feeling embarrassed, I quickly ran to the other side of the car and let myself in. The palm trees and green vegetation reminded me of California. I didn't mind the heat (90F) or humidity too much because I was on an adventure.  The National Library, place of the conference Being at a hotel by myself was weird at first, but then I enjoyed the quietness of no kids, students, homemaking, etc... The awards ceremony was very formal with a Singaporean government official attending--the Parliamentary Secretary for the Ministry of Education handed out awards. His Excellency, the Ambassador to Singapore from Japan was also there since Japan was the country of focus for the conference. 

The winner of the Scholastic Asian Book Award was an Indian author, whose premise I thought was really good! She's had a previous novel published as well. I was happy to receive 1st Runner Up, and the editor from Scholastic Asia wants to publish it. I look forward to hearing details from her. 

I also loved connecting with online writing friends and people whose blogs I've read or are popular in the kidlit world--Emily Lim I met in 12x12, Leonard Marcus I've heard and read about in SCBWI, Cynthia Leitich Smith who runs the Cynsations writing blog, Charlene Chua, Canadian illustrator whom I met in the SCBWI "Blueboards," and Cynthea Liu, of the popular Red Light Green Light contest.

​ Parliamentary Secretary far right, Winner-3rd from the right, and me, the short one in the middle, black & white dress me, Leonard Marcus- historian and author, chief judge of the Scholastic Asian Book Awards me, Emily Lim, who I met in 12x12, Singaporean author me, Cynthia Leitich Smith-author of Cynsations blog and many books me, Charlene Chua-illustrator who I met in SCBWI "Blueboards" me, Cynthea Liu, author and publisher, I had won a picture book critique from her 2 yrs ago from her Red Light Green Light contest. We had a great chat! Look for more about my experience on June 2nd at the Grog Blog!

A Writer's Beginning and Singapore

The Fall of 2014 I was contacted by a writing friend in Singapore, Emily Lim, who I met online through a writing challenge called 12x12. Emily was going to be a part of a writing project about Asian authors and wanted to know if I wanted to join the book project as well. We were to write a chapter about how God led us into writing. 

This project was part of Media Associates International and Graceworks Publishing. MAI's goal states, "MAI equips and nurtures talented men and women with a passion for producing Christian literature for their own people." They train people to write through books, workshops, and conferences around the world.

So I'm privileged to be a part of this book with 11 other authors living in Asia. In fact, you can see an excerpt of my chapter here along with a list of the other wonderful writers. I'm thankful to God for using me as His scribe. If you know of anyone who is contemplating being a writer, have them read this book! The way these people came to write is fascinating!

And even more wonderful is that this coming week I'll meet author Emily Lim in person! I'm flying to Singapore for the Asian Festival of Children's Content. I'll attend the Scholastic Asian Book Award ceremony on Tuesday night and then one full day of the writer's conference on Wednesday and then fly back to Korea. This is my FIRST writer's conference, believe it or not. So if you have any tips, let me know! My lovely husband helped me get business cards printed, which I can't do on my own here. I will blog about the AFCC in the weeks to come. Stay tuned! I left off my phone # because I'm overseas. Email works best! or Twitter.