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Asian Festival of Children’s Content

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In this session, the panel shares about how they have tackled the topic of special needs and presented it in stories for children. Learn more about how writers can present such topics in an accessible way to children.

Diversity

Abirami Kanan

Abirami Kanan (Singapore)

Abirami is currently an Education Support Teacher at Presbyterian Preschool Services. She supports and guides children with special needs to integrate them into a mainstream classroom setting, alongside mainstream peers. She has been in the Preschool industry for the past 8 years. She started off as a Kindergarten teacher before switching over to Early Intervention. During her years as a Kindergarten teacher, she always had students with learning disabilities or special needs in every class she taught. Hence, she has always been involved in creating an inclusive setting for children with special needs.

Jill Lim

Jill Lim (Singapore)

Jill has been in the fields of journalism and editing for more than 25 years and has, at various times, been a newspaper reporter, a copyeditor, a sub-editor and a magazine editor. She became a book editor with Straits Times Press in 2017. As the mother of three daughters, the oldest of whom has autism, she was inspired to pen a children’s book on autism and family relationships. The result: My Colouring Book is Ruined!, published in March 2019. It was shortlisted for the Popular Readers’ Choice Awards in 2019. She has written three other children’s books, on pet ownership, which were published in 2021.

Nur Ilyana Bte Mohd Ali

Nur Ilyana Bte Mohd Ali (Singapore)

Nur Ilyana is a mother of four. Her third child, Alyssa, has Down’s Syndrome. Ilyana left her job as a primary school teacher when Alyssa was born to take care of Alyssa and her family. Ilyana’s interests include reading, writing, poetry, cooking and teaching. She is an advocate for children with Down’s Syndrome and hopes to do more for the Down’s Syndrome community and raise awareness of Down’s Syndrome.

Quek Hong Shin

Moderator Quek Hong Shin (Singapore)

Hong Shin is a Singaporean picture book author and illustrator. He has illustrated several picture books and his work has been shortlisted twice for The Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award. His book The Incredible Basket, published by Epigram Books, was the winner of Best Children's Book at the 2019 Singapore Book Awards.

All programme dates and times are subject to change and existing COVID measures.

* : Pre-registration is required for in-person events. Seats are allocated on a first-come, first-served basis.

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