These are the caves Beneath the waves, Where stripy fish with featery fins And sharks with hideous toothy grins Swam round the whale And the snail on his tail. My real breakthrough was THE GRUFFALO, again illustrated by Axel. We work separately - he’s in London and I’m in Glasgow - but he sends me letters with lovely funny pictures on the envelopes. But when disaster strikes and the whale is beached in a bay, it is the tiny snail who saves the day.

Icebergs, fiery mountains and golden sands, caves beneath the crashing waves, and storm tossed seas are all part of the adventure. And then the whale gets lost and he ends up on the beach in trying to avoid speedboats. It looks like the end of the journey for the poor whale. And this is the snail with the itchy foot! “A snail! A snail!” The teacher turns pale. “Look!” say the children. ”It's leaving a trail.” This is the trail Of the tiny snail, A silvery trail saying . . . There are lots of adjectives and other descriptive words in the story which describe different things. Can you find them all? Could you make a poster which shows what they are? The Snail and the Whale won the 2004 Early Years award for the best pre-school book, the 2005 Blue Peter award for Best Book to Read Aloud, and the 2007 Giverny award for Best Science Picture Book. The audio version, which includes The Snail and the Whale song, won the Spoken Book gold award for best audio for 6 and under. And she gazed at the sky, the sea, the land, The waves and the caves and the golden sand, She gazed and gazed, amazed by it all, And she said to the whale, “I feel so small.”A beautiful tale of an unlikely friendship, a tour of the world and a heroic rescue. Based on the picture book written by Julia Donaldson and illustrated by Axel Scheffler. The pair endured thunderstorms and zigzag lightning and the snail was amazed by everything she encountered and everything she saw and when she gazed at the sky, the sea, the land and the waves she was often heard to say, 'I feel so small.' I really enjoy writing verse, even though it can be fiendishly difficult. I used to memorise poems as a child and it means a lot to me when parents tell me their child can recite one of my books. Funnily enough, I find it harder to write not in verse, though I feel I am now getting the hang of it! My novel THE GIANTS AND THE JONESES is going to be made into a film by the same team who made the Harry Potter movies, and I have written three books of stories about the anarchic PRINCESS MIRROR-BELLE who appears from the mirror and disrupts the life of an otherwise ordinary eight-year-old. I have just finished writing a novel for teenagers. Julia Donaldson is one of today's most popular writers. Her bestselling titles include The Gruffalo, The Gruffalo's Child and Room on the Broom. Although she is best-known for her picture books, Julia also writes longer novels, plays and songs. She lives in Glasgow and spends a lot of time on stage performing her brilliant sell-out singalong shows!

I grew up in a tall Victorian London house with my parents, grandmother, aunt, uncle, younger sister Mary and cat Geoffrey (who was really a prince in disguise. Mary and I would argue about which of us would marry him). The Snail and the Whale by Julia Donaldson is a fantastically written story which outlines the random travels of an unlikely duo. Through Axel Scheffler's use of colourful illustrations, the catchy rhyming and alliterations throughout the story, we get to see all of the places that the pair encountered on their travels, including the "towering iceberg", "far-away lands" and " golden sands". The audiobook with an accompanying audio cassette, is narrated by English voice actor Imelda Staunton, while the audiobook with an accompanying compact disc is narrated by Scottish voice actor David Tennant.This is the sky So vast and high Sometimes sunny and blue and warm, Sometimes filled with a thunderstorm, With zigzag lightning Flashing and frightening The tiny snail On the tail of the whale. This is the tide coming into the bay, And these are the villagers shouting, “Hooray!” As the whale and the snail travel safely away . . . At the end of the story, the snail tells his friends all about his adventure. Can you write what he might have said to them?

There once was a snail that hitched a ride on the tail of the whale, and off they went to travel the world at sea. Read this again (November 2019) as I can't resist the brilliant Donaldson/Scheffler combination. And it is just as good, if not better, than when I first read it.On 6 November 2018, it was announced that BBC One and Magic Light Pictures would bring audiences The Snail and the Whale for Christmas 2019. The music is supplied by French composer and musician Rene Aubry, [4] and the animation was provided by Triggerfish Animation Studios. [5] The 26-minute production aired on BBC One at 2:30pm on 25 December 2019, [6] and again at 2:05pm on 1 January 2020. It was released on DVD on 10 February 2020 in the United Kingdom.

Imagine that you had to write a newspaper report about the people (and the snail) who saved the whale. What would it say? Before Malcolm and I had our three sons we used to go busking together and I would write special songs for each country; the best one was in Italian about pasta.If it seems strange that these two would be travelling companions, we will learn as we read this story, that this snail and whale each play an important role in each other’s lives. While I agree that The Gruffalo is undeniably a fantastic children's book, The Snail and the Whale is by far my favourite of Donaldson's. I found my nursery class on SEB absolutely adored this book and I ended up reading it to at least 2 of them in the book corner every day! The book won the Early Years award for the best pre-school book in 2004, the Blue Peter award for Best Book to Read Aloud, 2005, [2] and the Giverny award for Best Science Picture Book 2007. [3] The Snail and the Whale, review: Fine for youngsters, but Nemo won't be losing any sleep, The Independent, 25 December 2019