Posts Tagged: Crinkling News
Publishing Our Kids’ Voices Can Change The World
On my left wrist, I wear three bands. One is weaved pink, yellow and orange elastic, another is a black cord with six coloured beads, and the third is a purple leather cuff.
Each of them has a deeply personal story. But I want to share the story behind just one: the purple leather cuff.
Six years ago, a Bulgarian craftswoman made it for me. Engraved in cursive writing, it says:
“As I write my sorrows disappear and my courage is reborn.”
Beautiful statement, isn’t it? Do you recognise the words?
They were first penned by a 15-year-old girl, one Tuesday in April 1944.
How do I know that? Because that 15-year-old is the most prolific teenaged author in literary history: Anne Frank.
A few months after she wrote those words, her diary abruptly ends.
On her last entry, August 1, 1944, she wrote:
“… I keep on trying to find a way of becoming what I would so like to be, and what I could be, if there weren’t any other people living in this world.”
What did Anne Frank want to be? A journalist.
She wrote that over and over again, that once she was released from the Secret Annexe, she would pursue a career in journalism.
I must’ve read her diary more than thirty times since I first picked it up in early high school. You may have a comfort food, I have a comfort book. And it’s hers.
It was not her words that first attracted me, it was her face. Dark brown eyes, curly brown hair and a prominent European nose. Just like me.
And her name: Anne Marie Frank. Just like me: Emma Marie Horn. Nothing remarkable or memorable.
But her words have since written themselves across my life. I wear them now, on my left hand – the hand I write with. Her legacy has inspired me and many others.
What if this teenager did not write her diary? What if she did not believe herself worthy to transcribe her wartime experience?
What if her father – Otto, the only survivor of the Frank family – did not empower her first by giving her the diary, the pen, and the freedom to write?
What if Otto, upon returning to the Secret Annexe, did not see the value in publishing his daughter’s words?
In 1955, the play adaptation of the diary opened on Broadway. Seven cities in Germany hosted the play throughout 1956. A year later, it opened in Amsterdam, Holland – the city Anne had once called home.
Germany was the first country in Europe to host the play.
It’s rumoured that at the end of one matinee in a small German town, when the curtain fell, faint sobbing was heard.
It grew exponentially to a communal grief as one audience member after another began responding to what they had seen.
The horrors of the Second World War were unknown to many German soldiers and civilians until the words of one 15-year-old girl sparked a national conversation.
One Dutch girl helped the world to grieve and process what had happened. And her legacy continues.
In Australia, it’s easy to feel detached from the events in Europe. Many Australian teenagers continue to read the Diary of Anne Frank. And so they should.
But over time, we have forgotten to encourage our children to find their voice.
We have not shown them that their words can make a difference.
For the past twelve months, a small team of journalists across the country have tried to fix that. They have given our nation’s children a voice, empowering them to speak and be heard.
Some have been given the opportunity to interview the Prime Minister, others have met state and national politicians, and Nobel prize winners.
They have written opinion pieces on the issues that affect them. Everything from coping with dyslexia to understanding Tourette’s syndrome.
But in two days time, that will all end, unless Crinkling News finds an enormous injection of funds.
Most European countries have a national newspaper for kids. Some countries have more than one. They understand that giving a voice to children can change the world.
But Crinkling News is the only place Australian kids can go to be heard on a national level.
Just like Otto Frank, its founder Saffron Howden, has seen the value in publishing their words. And it has already proved enormously important to so many kids.
Crinkling News should be an institution. Please help to keep it alive long enough to become one.
Our kids deserve to be heard.
Update: Crinkling News managed to raise beyond its funding goal, with time to spare. Thank you to all who contributed.
But it is always a good time to subscribe to Crinkling News!
Why Our Kids Desperately Need Crinkling News
I started kindergarten in 1999.
That makes me part of the last generation to be in school in two different millennia. But that’s something I didn’t realise until much later.
Here are a few of the things I remember from 1999: my mum and her friends’ brightly coloured thick knitwear dresses, a pair of red overalls I loved to death, and the ABC TV reports on United Nations peacekeeping operations in East Timor.
No really. That’s the extent of my pre-millennium memory.
The sound of the ABC nightly news theme still brings those feelings back to me. So vivid was my connection, that in my mind, it has remained the soundtrack to East Timor.
My dad says he remembers how often I would ask about the ‘war’ in East Timor.
How many people had been hurt? How will it affect Australia?
I asked anyone who’d care to listen. My kindergarten teacher eventually told my parents I had a morbid fascination that was frightening the other kids in my class.
Consequently, I didn’t have too many friends in kindergarten. Not to worry, I soon forgot about East Timor.
Who could think of such triviality anyway, when the dreaded Millennium Bug loomed?
I was terrified of the Millennium Bug.
I was convinced I would die of it. Whatever it was, I wasn’t quite sure. I knew it would be a painful death. And seven years old was far too young to die.
But no, I did not die.
A year later, I would wish I had died in the Millennial Bug, though.
I was eight years old when two planes brought New York’s Twin Towers to the ground.
My teacher wouldn’t let us talk about it. I understand now, she was just as confused as us kids. She didn’t know how to process it either. But I needed to talk about it.
For two weeks, I was afraid to sleep.
I cried a lot. I woke up in cold sweats. I saw replays on television, I heard reports on the radio, and they played unendingly through my brain.
I was terrified.
And I had no-one to talk to about it.
My parents did their best to reassure me. I suspect they worried about the amount of ‘adult news’ I was consuming. But how could they stop me?
I was 10 years old when the internet was installed in our school library.
And suddenly I had an almost unfiltered access to all the horrors the world over.
I was very lonely and confused throughout my years at school. I had no way to make sense of what seemed to be an incredibly hostile world.
Through high school and university, I learnt better ways to cope with the brutality of it all. At least, I learnt more effective ways to hide my fear.
But then, when I finished university, a faint glimmer of hope was allowed to grow within me, perhaps for the first time in my life.
It was ignited and fanned by Saffron Howden, and the incredible team of journalists at Crinkling News.
Crinkling News is Australia’s only national newspaper for kids. It deals with the news that excites, frightens, shocks or confuses our nation’s young people.
It makes sense of all the things that made me so frightened as a child.
I met Crinkling‘s editor, Saffron when I was just weeks out of university. She had her toddler daughter with her.
She would never have to endure the intense loneliness and fear I felt at her age. She would have Crinkling News.
So, when I write, I think of that toddler as I remember her, and I think of my primary school self. About the sleepless nights, the silent pain, the many tears, that characterised my childhood.
And I think how fortunate are the kids of Australia today, that they have a team of people who are dedicated to explaining the world and allaying their fears.
Perhaps, if Crinkling News was around when I was in primary school, I would not have felt such unspeakable loneliness. Perhaps I would have been better equipped to understand the world. Perhaps I would have seen some beauty alongside the pain.
But now, the kids of Australia could be left without this hope.
Crinkling News has announced it will close its doors next week if it cannot achieve critical funding.
Crinkling News is not only crucial for informing the next generation of world leaders, it is potentially life-saving. And I speak through truckloads of my own experience.
I refuse to let this be the end!
Update: Crinkling News achieved its funding goal with time to spare. Thank you to all who contributed!
But it is always a good time to subscribe to the national newspaper for kids!
Crinkling News: Launching This Week!
Australia’s only national newspaper written specifically for children (aged 7-14), comes out on April 25, 2016.
I have been honoured to be a part of this exciting new publication! Launching a printed newspaper in this day-and-age may seem a little risky. Most newspapers are quickly going down the gurgler (I’ll direct your attention to recent events in Fairfax Media).
A newspaper for children is well overdue and very, very exciting!
I finished my journalism degree at the University of Sydney, and returned from overseas in January. I was going through the process of applying (and being rejected) for every cadetship and internship in the business.
Then I saw Crinkling’s editor, Saffron Howden, discussing her new endeavour on ABC.
I absolutely fell in love with it! A newspaper for children – why had no-one else thought of that?
My exposure to journalism as a child was directly responsible for my decision to pursue the profession in adulthood.
I started kindergarten in 1999. That makes me the last generation to attend school in two millennia, a fact I was very unaware of until much later.
1999 was also the year of the East Timorese Crisis. And that’s what I remember.
When other kids were watching cartoons, I was watching ABC’s rolling coverage on East Timor.
I didn’t fully understand what was happening – I don’t think I could even point to East Timor on a map by that stage.
But I remember asking my parents, teachers and really anyone else who’d care to listen, what was happening over there? For perhaps the entire year, it was the only thing I spoke about.
I knew it was going to affect Australia, but I didn’t know how.
No-one gave me answers. My teacher told me I didn’t need to worry about that, she even told my parents she thought it was unwise to let me watch the news.
I felt like information was being censored – not that I had the vocabulary to express that then.
Perhaps, if Crinkling News was around twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have become so frustrated. Or maybe I needed that frustration to send me down the path that would eventually lead to my involvement with the Crinkling. We’ll never know.
All I know is this: the news is far too important to leave children out of the discussion.
So, do you have kids aged 7-14?
Are you a primary school teacher looking to help your class form balanced opinions about the world?
Or are you, like me, an adult who often finds it hard to admit that I just don’t always understand what’s happening around me?
Be embarrassed no longer! Crinkling News is here to help.