Pamela Butchart Joins Blue Peter Book Awards 2016 Panel

A school teacher, Pamela Butchart who won last year’s Blue Peter Best Story Award will join a brilliant panel of judges for the Blue Peter Book Awards 2016.

The Spy Who Loved School Dinners collage

Pamela Butchart, who teaches philosophy at secondary school, and last year won Blue Peter Best Story with her book ‘The Spy Who Loved School Dinners’ (H’s favourite from the shortlisted books), will join television and radio presenter Angellica Bell, National Literacy Trust’s programme manager Jim Sells and Blue Peter editor Ewan Vinnicombe.

The enormously popular Blue Peter Book Awards, which are managed by the reading charity Book Trust, celebrate the best authors, the most creative illustrators and the greatest reads for children.

Former winner Pamela Butchart, who spent much of her wedding day last year at a book signing, said: ‘I’m thrilled to have been asked to judge this year’s Blue Peter Book Awards. It really is an awesome honour – thank you. It was a dream come true to win the award in 2015 (I rarely take my badge off!) I can’t wait to help find this year’s winning books.
‘As a teacher, author and lover of children’s books I’ll be on the lookout for fantastic books that encourage reading for pleasure.’

Blue Peter editor, Ewan Vinnicombe said: ‘This year we’ve got a fantastic panel to judge our Book Awards and I’m looking forward to seeing which titles they shortlist, in what looks like an impressive year for children’s literature.’

The Blue Peter Awards 2016 will celebrate children’s books published in the last year in two categories: Best Story and Best Book with Facts. There will be three shortlisted books for each award chosen by the panel of judges and announced on Blue Peter on 3 December 2015.

At least 200 children from ten schools across the UK will then read the shortlisted books and vote for their favourites in each category. The two winning books will be announced on the Blue Peter programme scheduled for World Book Day on 3 March 2016.

The judges for this year’s awards are:

• Angellica Bell – TV presenter, mum and blogger
• Ewan Vinnicombe – (non-voting chair) Editor, Blue Peter
• Jim Sells – National Literacy Trust Programme Manager
• Pamela Butchart – winner of the Blue Peter Story Book 2015

Blue Peter Book Awards Judges 2015

The Blue Peter Book Awards have been celebrating children’s literature since 2000. The reading charity Book Trust has managed the Blue Peter Book Awards since 2008. The 2015 winners were Pamela Butchart who won Best Story with ‘The Spy Who Loved School Dinners’, illustrations by Thomas Flintham; and Andy Seed, a former primary teacher and deputy head for 17 years, who won Best Book with Facts with ‘The Silly Book of Side-Splitting Stuff’, illustrated by Scott Garrett.

Keep up-to-date with the Awards at www.booktrust.org.uk/bluepeter and on Twitter by following @Booktrust and #BPBA

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