New Stories, New Site & New Book Week Activities

First up, thank you to everyone who reached out during the recent flooding here in Port Macquarie. Thankfully, I was safe and dry – but like many in our area, our school was closed, and I found myself with a rare pocket of time to work on some of the big updates that have been waiting in the wings for Learn From Play.

Over the past few months, I’ve been listening closely to your feedback. One of the biggest things I’ve heard is that while the resources are loved, the website was unresponsive and it could be difficult to find what you need and take advantage of all we have to offer. So, I’ve been hard at work redesigning the site to make it clearer, simpler and much more user-friendly. Soon, you’ll be able to download full activity sets for each book with a single click – no more downloading individual pages one by one. Whether you’re after Book Activities, Maths ‘n’ Movement lessons, or posters, everything will be easier to browse, search and access.

But that’s not all. I’ve also been developing something brand new for our community – original Learn From Play Social Stories.

The very first one will be released in the next fortnight as a video picture book is called “Luca Washes Away the Ninja Germs” and is all about why it’s important to wash your hands after going to the toilet. It’s designed with learning in mind: each word will be highlighted as it’s read aloud, helping children connect sound, spelling and meaning. It supports auditory and visual learners, and is an engaging way to reinforce routines. You can see two possible covers below to give you a feel for where we are heading with this and I’d love your thoughts on whether this is something you would use with your students!

Assuming teachers want and need this in their classrooms, I am hoping to release lots more of these this year but I want to know – what Social Stories would you like to see? Ideas already on my list include:

• Have a go before asking the teacher for help.

• How to share and be a good classmate.

• The importance of using kind words with others.

• How to understand emotions through Zones of Regulation.

• Recognising one’s feelings and knowing how to respond.

If you have something you’d love to see addressed in story form, please reply or message me – I’m all ears.

Meanwhile, our weekly rollout of CBCA notable book activities is going strong. We’ve just added four new titles with full activity packs available here.

Each set is packed with creative, syllabus-aligned activities that encourage comprehension, critical thinking and joy in reading. We will continue to release at least 2 book sets a week so make sure you check our socials or our website home page for our latest releases.

And, finally – after the amazing celebration of reading with National Simultaneous Storytime – we now turn our attention to Book Week. As soon as the new site goes live, in the next couple of weeks, we will release a brand-new suite of activities themed around this year’s slogan – "Book an Adventure". You’ll be able to download our Book Week activity sets to help your class explore the wonder of stories, imagination and reading adventures. If you haven’t done so already I suggest you grab the compass we made for the CBCA which can be found for FREE on pages 47 and 48 of their 2025 Digital Planner. https://store.cbca.org.au/products/2025-digital-yearly-planner

Thanks again for being part of Learn From Play – your messages, subscriptions and feedback are what keep this whole thing going and we would love to hear what we can create to help your class engage in reading, learning, and having fun! 

Stay dry, and I can’t wait to share what’s next!