Elementary School Author Visits 2025-2026

One of my favorite parts of being an author and illustrator of children's books is visiting elementary schools. I thoroughly enjoy interacting with kids and getting to visit interesting corners of these United States.

This school year I gave (and will give) my author presentation to plenty of K-5 schools. Some were all-school assemblies and others were classroom visits. Regardless of the size of the group, I keep my program interactive and fun by asking the students lots of questions, showing lots of visuals and reading a book or two.

When I am talking about school visits with other children's books authors, they say things like, "You author/illustrators are lucky - you get to talk about art." They are right, it is an easy point of connection. Most elementary school-aged kids like to draw and make art, so when I visit a school, we have fun talking art. I also like to think of the art talk as a side-door for reluctant readers to engage with books. Reading might be a chore for them, but the art isn't and that keeps them looking at the pages.

Interestingly, there are also a fair amount of students in most groups that write stories for themselves. I didn't think that would be the case, but consistently, when I ask who writes stories or makes books for fun, lots of hands go up. And actually most students have a pretty good understanding of how a story works and are able to come up with great ideas when we create a quick story together.

The best student comment of this school year so far? A disappointed student told me after the presentation, that "I wanted you to have hair and not glasses." I took my glasses off for him and he seemed appeased.

For information on booking a children's author visit, fill out the form on my Author Visit page and I will send you more information including an estimate on the total cost for your school.

I visit all states: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming