Friday, January 25, 2019

Turn Your Child into a Book Character with TimTimTom

Convincing the children to read a book, in a world overwhelmed by the fascination of devices and gadgets is becoming more and more difficult. Although, personally I have nothing against gadgets and I am myself quite an active social media user and consumer, my love for books - both e-books and in physical form - doesn't compare with any other 2.0 temptation. I was, been and will be a person deeply connected with the written word, especially if it is transmitted into a variety of languages.
Therefore, when I was offered the occasion to get to know TimTimTom, an edition house that not only published books, but it brings your child a a character into the story, I couldn't wait to see what it is all about. TimTimTom is an independent publisher of bilingual personalized books. There are 10 languages available to set up the story with your child as the main character: Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Chinese (both simplified and traditional). There are 100 personalization available the choice being made within minutes on their websites.
I ordered for my son a book in German - a language that he is starting to learn intensively since starting the German Kindergarten - with him as one of the characters of a main ballet Swanlake show. I was impressed by the quality of the paper and illustrations while my 3 yo son had a lot of fun to see himself part of a story with a very important role to play. Reading him in German, which is not his mother tongue, was a lot of fun, as he enjoyed being told what he did in the book and what fantastic adventures expected him. According to the website, stories and languages are regularly added, therefore if you did not find a variant available in a specific language, maybe in the near future, such a thing might be possible.
I grew up as a multilingual child myself and reading books in my main languages was always a challenge and stirred up my passion for stories, writing but also opened up the windows to a world of diversity where the difference matters and shall be respected. I am glad I had the chance to get to know such an important project for multicultural children and families and hopefully will be able to share more about their future achievements another time.


Disclaimer: The personalised book for my son was generously offered by TimTimTom part of an online events organised on the occasion of the Multicultural Children's Book Day

Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2019 (1/25/19) is in its 6th year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Our mission is to raise awareness of the ongoing need to include kids’ books that celebrate diversity in homes and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents and educators. 

MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Medallion Sponsors on board!

*View our 2019 Medallion Sponsors here: https://wp.me/P5tVud-
*View our 2019 MCBD Author Sponsors here: https://wp.me/P5tVud-2eN

Medallion Level Sponsors

Honorary: Children’s Book CouncilThe Junior Library GuildTheConsciousKid.org.

Super Platinum: Make A Way Media

GOLD: Bharat BabiesCandlewick PressChickasaw Press, Juan Guerra and The Little Doctor / El doctorcitoKidLitTV,  Lerner Publishing GroupPlum Street Press,

SILVER: Capstone PublishingCarole P. RomanAuthor Charlotte RiggleHuda EssaThe Pack-n-Go Girls,

BRONZE: Charlesbridge PublishingJudy Dodge CummingsAuthor Gwen JacksonKitaab WorldLanguage Lizard – Bilingual & Multicultural Resources in 50+ LanguagesLee & Low BooksMiranda Paul and Baptiste Paul, RedfinAuthor Gayle H. Swift,  T.A. Debonis-Monkey King’s DaughterTimTimTom BooksLin ThomasSleeping Bear Press/Dow PhumirukVivian Kirkfield,

MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Author Sponsors on board

Honorary: Julie FlettMehrdokht Amini,

Author Janet BallettaAuthor Kathleen BurkinshawAuthor Josh FunkChitra SoundarOne Globe Kids – Friendship StoriesSociosights Press and Almost a MinyanKaren LeggettAuthor Eugenia ChuCultureGroove BooksPhelicia Lang and Me On The PageL.L. WaltersAuthor Sarah StevensonAuthor Kimberly Gordon BiddleHayley BarrettSonia PanigrahAuthor Carolyn Wilhelm, Alva Sachs and Dancing DreidelsAuthor Susan BernardoMilind Makwana and A Day in the Life of a Hindu KidTara WilliamsVeronica AppletonAuthor Crystal BoweDr. Claudia MayAuthor/Illustrator Aram KimAuthor Sandra L. RichardsErin DealeyAuthor Sanya Whittaker GraggAuthor Elsa TakaokaEvelyn Sanchez-ToledoAnita BadhwarAuthor Sylvia LiuFeyi Fay AdventuresAuthor Ann MorrisAuthor Jacqueline JulesCeCe & Roxy BooksSandra Neil Wallace and Rich WallaceLEUYEN PHAMPadma VenkatramanPatricia Newman and Lightswitch LearningShoumi SenValerie Williams-Sanchez and Valorena Publishing, Traci SorellShereen RahmingBlythe StanfelChristina MatulaJulie RubiniPaula ChaseErin TwamleyAfsaneh MoradianLori DeMonia, Claudia Schwam, Terri Birnbaum/ RealGirls RevolutionSoulful SydneyQueen Girls Publications, LLC

We’d like to also give a shout-out to MCBD’s impressive CoHost Team who not only hosts the book review link-up on celebration day, but who also works tirelessly to spread the word of this event. View our CoHosts HERE.
Co-Hosts and Global Co-Hosts
TWITTER PARTY Sponsored by Make A Way Media: MCBD’s super-popular (and crazy-fun) annual @McChildsBookDay Twitter Party will be held 1/25/19 at 9:00pm.E.S.T. TONS of prizes and book bundles will be given away during the party ( a prize every 5 minutes!). GO HERE for more details.
FREE RESOURCES From MCBD
Free Multicultural Books for Teachers: http://bit.ly/1kGZrta
Free Empathy Classroom Kit for Homeschoolers, Organizations, Librarians and Educators: http://multiculturalchildrensbookday.com/teacher-classroom-empathy-kit/
Hashtag: Don’t forget to connect with us on social media and be sure and look for/use our official hashtag #ReadYourWorld.

4 comments:

  1. I've been impressed with TimTimTom Books since 2017 when I first discovered their awesomeness. Thanks for sharing!

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    1. My pleasure! TimTimTom Books is such an awesome publishing project, indeed!

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  2. Thank you for sharing on the MCBD linky and for your support of Multicultural Children's Book Day! My kids always loved personalized books but the ones we had access to when they were small did not have diversity characters that looked like them.

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    1. My pleasure to be for the second year part of this awesome event. Teaching children diversity is such a big challenge and having the right books is so important from a very early age!

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