Grandad's Camper: A picture book for children that celebrates LGBTQIA+ families

Product Information

The depiction of a loving, same-sex relationship between Grandad and Gramps, as well as the different ethnicities of the main characters, ensure this wonderfully inclusive book reflects a range of experiences, representative of today’s society. Her favourite pastime, however, is to snuggle up with Grandad while he shares tales of his past adventures with Gramps. The art throughout Grandad's Camper is dashing, the layouts somehow chockablock and yet never too busy.

The little girl can see how much her Grandad loved travelling and how much he loved Gramps, and asks him why he doesn't travel any more, but Grandad just can't see the point without Gramps. This debut picture book from award-winning author-illustrator Harry Woodgate won the British Book Awards Nibbie for Children's Illustrated Book of the Year and the Waterstones Children's Book Prize, was shortlisted for the Polari Prize, and named as an ALA Stonewall Honor Book.When Grandad reflects back on his life with Gramps, his memories take the visual form of vignettes showing the younger versions of the men--Grandad white, Gramps with the same brown skin tone as the girl--on the road, at home, or enjoying the great outdoors, but always delighted to be together. It is clear that the love of grandad's life (Gramps)' s a man but the book never feels the need to state this in an overt way, it is lovely how this fact is just a natural part of the story. This is a quiet story that speaks volumes, and astute educators and storytellers will be able to use the book in both intimate storytimes and with larger groups.

So, their amazing granddaughter comes up with a clever plan to fix up the old camper and get Grandad excited to explore again. She loves to examine the fabulous knick-knacks he has collected on his travels and play hide and seek in his amazing garden. Discover a wonderful grandfather-granddaughter relationship, as a little girl hatches the perfect plan to get her Grandad adventuring again. The little girl has an idea and together they tend to the camper van and take it to the beach, just like Gramps would have wanted.Following this, children create expanded noun phrases to enhance their descriptive writing and use these to support them in writing poetry about an object which holds a special memory to them. I love that it is an intergenerational story in which a grandchild and grandfather are just loving spending time together.

Before they were Grandad and Gramps, two young men, waving a rainbow flag from their pink VW bus, were a romantic couple, traveling the world-or at least Europe-together, camping under the stars. The book reflects on an aspect of mature gay life, a piercing sense of loss, and in the child, of the possibilities still to be found. Grandad has the kind of garden I dream of, growing fruit and vegetables, including delicious cherries, and the pair play hide-and-seek together there. Delightfully colourful and carrying a warm, positive message of inclusion and love, Woodgate's uplifting picture book depicts a grandad recapturing the adventures of his youth courtesy of his granddaughter. Still, there is a wholesome gentility to every page, of enjoying every minute, even in memory, of growing sweet cherries in the garden, and of filling a home with mementos and stories.This is a beautiful, sweet, touching and honest story of a tender conversation between a grandad and granddaughter. Caregivers, especially older ones, may see this book as an opportunity to talk about departed loved ones and introduce their happy memories to a younger generation-many a family will find themselves pulling out photo albums to relate their own origin stories. While there, the protagonist, who narrates, and their grandfather play the usual games and do the usual activities, but Grandad also tells stories about how he and Gramps, a man of color who is now deceased, met and fell in love while traveling in an old VW microbus. Every summer, the narrator of this heart-warming tale goes to stay with her grandad in his pretty old cottage by the sea.

Immediately on opening the book you are greeted with the most breathtaking bucolic scene across the endpapers as Grandad and Gramps drive rambling hills in their pink camper van. They will practice writing in the past progressive by creating captions for the photo album and develop their skill at writing questions in role as the little girl by interviewing Grandad about his campervan adventures. The story is really lovely and delicately handles the issue of death and also helped me to discuss different family set ups with my daughter in a fun and age appropriate way. The children begin the sequence of learning by exploring a dusty memory box from the attic which contains objects linked to Grandad’s memories of his time in the campervan with Gramps.The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. I absolutely adore it and am very excited to have matching artwork to proudly display when we move house! Harry Woodgate (they/them) is a multi-award-winning author and illustrator, whose debut picture book Grandad’s Camper won the British Book Awards Nibbie for Children's Illustrated Book of the Year and the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize, was shortlisted for the Polari Prize , and named as an ALA Stonewall Honor Book . It's so important that little ones grow up and see their type of family set-up reflected in the books you share with them. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.