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Margaret Roc (born 14 July 1945) is an Australian author, co-author and editor of over fifty published fiction and non-fiction books for children and teachers. [1]
Roc was born in Stirling, Scotland, the youngest of three children. She immigrated to Australia with her family at age eight in 1953.
Roc graduated in 1969 from the University of Sydney majoring in Psychology and Government and subsequently attained her Diploma in Education in 1970, also at the University of Sydney. She obtained her Remedial Teacher's Certificate in Special Education from the Kuring-gai College of Advanced Education (now part of the University of Technology, Sydney) in 1974. Other qualifications include her Masters of Arts (Education) in 1975 from the University of Sydney, her Masters of Arts (Creative Writing) in 2001 from the University of Western Sydney. In 2004 Roc obtained her Graduate Diploma of Information from the University of Technology, Sydney.
Roc has worked as a teacher, special needs teacher and teacher-librarian at a number of inner Sydney public schools and continues to teach in Sydney.
Roc has an ongoing collaboration with author and editor Kathleen Hawke. Their books Australia's Critically Endangered Animals and Australia's Deadly and Dangerous Animals and Plants are on the booklist for the Premier's Reading Challenge, a literacy initiative designed to promote reading to children.
Roc is a member of The Australian Society of Authors and the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators.
Roc married husband John in 1965. She has two children: James Roc, and actress Tasneem Roc.
Alfred Leslie Rowse was a British historian and writer, best known for his work on Elizabethan England and books relating to Cornwall.
Paul Jennings AM, is an English-born Australian children's book writer. His books mainly feature short stories that lead the reader through an unusual series of events that end with a twist. Many of his stories were adapted for the cult classic children's television series Round the Twist. Jennings collaborated with Morris Gleitzman on the book series Wicked!, which was adapted into an animated TV series in 2000.
Oodgeroo Noonuccal ( UUD-gə-roo NOO-nə-kəl; born Kathleen Jean Mary Ruska, later Kath Walker was an Aboriginal Australian political activist, artist and educator, who campaigned for Aboriginal rights. Noonuccal was best known for her poetry, and was the first Aboriginal Australian to publish a book of verse.
Blinky Bill is an anthropomorphic koala and children's fictional character created by author and illustrator Dorothy Wall. The character of Blinky first appeared in Brooke Nicholls' 1933 book, Jacko – the Broadcasting Kookaburra, which was illustrated by Wall. Wall then featured Blinky Bill in a series of her own books, including Blinky Bill: The Quaint Little Australian, Blinky Bill Grows Up, and Blinky Bill and Nutsy. The books are considered quintessential Australian children's classics, and have never been out of print in Australia.
Jennifer June Rowe,, is an Australian author. Her crime fiction for adults is published under her own name, while her children's fiction is published under the pseudonyms Emily Rodda and Mary-Anne Dickinson. She is well known for the children's fantasy series Deltora Quest, Rowan of Rin, Fairy Realm, Teen Power Inc., the Rondo trilogy and The Three Doors trilogy, and her latest His Name Was Walter.
Jamila Gavin is a British writer born in Mussoorie in the United Provinces of India, in the present-day state of Uttarakhand in the Western Himalayas. She is known mainly for children's books, including several with Indian contexts. Jamila Gavin is an author of children's books.
Ellen Dymphna Cusack AM was an Australian writer and playwright.
Merrion Frances "Mem" Fox, AM is an Australian writer of children's books and an educationalist specialising in literacy. Fox has been semi-retired since 1996, but she still gives seminars and lives in Adelaide, South Australia.
Julia Zemiro is a French-born Australian television presenter, radio host, actress, singer, writer and comedian. She is best known as the host of the music quiz and live performance show RocKwiz. Zemiro is a fluent French speaker and has acted in French.
Dame Marie Mildred Clay was a researcher from New Zealand known for her work in educational literacy. She was committed to the idea that children who struggle to learn to read and write can be helped with early intervention. A clinical psychologist, she developed the Reading Recovery intervention, a whole language programme in New Zealand, and expanded it worldwide.
Pixie O'Harris was a Welsh-born Australian artist, newspaper, magazine and book illustrator, author, broadcaster, caricaturist and cartoonist, designer of book plates, sheet music covers and stationery, and children's hospital ward fairy-style mural painter. She became patron to Sydney's Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children in 1977.
Pamela Freeman is an Australian author of books for both adults and children. Most of her work is fantasy but she has also written mystery stories, science fiction, family dramas and non-fiction. Her first adult series, the Castings Trilogy is published globally by Orbit Books. She is best known in Australia for the junior novel Victor’s Quest and an associated series, the Floramonde books, and for The Black Dress: Mary MacKillop’s Early Years, which won the NSW Premier's History Prize in 2006.
Bronwyn Bancroft is an Aboriginal Australian artist, and among the first Australian fashion designers invited to show her work in Paris. Born in Tenterfield, New South Wales, and trained in Canberra and Sydney, Bancroft worked as a fashion designer, and is an artist, illustrator, and arts administrator.
Ann Catherine Stewart James is an Australian illustrator of more than 60 children's books, some of which she also wrote. She was born in Melbourne, Victoria. James has been illustrating books since the 1980s and has become a significant contributor towards the development and appreciation of children's literature in Australia. In 2000 she was awarded the Pixie O'Harris Award as a formal acknowledgment of this contribution and was also the 2002 recipient of the national Dromkeen Medal for services towards children's literature. Ann James currently still lives and works in Melbourne, where she runs the Books Illustrated gallery and studio that she co-founded with Ann Haddon in 1988.
Possum Magic is a 1983 children's picture book by Australian author Mem Fox, and illustrated by Julie Vivas. It concerns a young female possum, named Hush, who becomes invisible and has a number of adventures. In 2001, a film was made by the American company Weston Woods and narrated by the author.
Alma Flor Ada is a Cuban-American author of children's books, poetry, and novels. A Professor Emerita at the University of San Francisco, she is recognized for her work promoting bilingual and multicultural education in the United States.
Dianne "Di" Bates is an Australian writer and teacher.
Louise Zarmati is an Australian archaeologist, educator, and author. She is most notable for pioneering Archaeology education in schools in Australia.
Elisabeth MacIntyre was an Australian writer and illustrator. She mainly produced children's picture books and cartoon strips, but also created cartoon strips for adults and novels for young adults. She is recognised as "a staunch advocate of promoting Australian animals and surrounds in an era when the majority of children's books were imported from England". Her picture books appealed for their lively, bright illustrations and "irresistible", "infectious", stories, which used line and words economically and effectively. She was successful in the Australian, American and British markets, and some of her novels were also translated into German and Japanese. Her best known works are Ambrose Kangaroo, Susan, Who Lives in Australia, and Hugh's Zoo, for which she won the Australian Children's Book of the Year Award: Picture Book in 1965.
Frances Helen Christie, is Emeritus professor of language and literacy education at the University of Melbourne, and honorary professor of education at the University of Sydney. She specialises in the field of systemic functional linguistics (SFL) and has completed research in language and literacy education, writing development, pedagogic grammar, genre theory, and teaching English as a mother tongue and as a second language.