Bringing books and authors to kids

Two dozen authors visited campuses in the Newport-Mesa Unified School District on Thursday to read to students and talk about the writing process, as the district held its 10th annual Authors Festival.

The festival, founded by retired teacher Joan Hansen, sends professional writers to every elementary school in the district as well as to TeWinkle Middle School, which has sixth-grade classes.

Hansen, who taught in the Long Beach Unified School District, has founded authors festivals in a number of districts around Southern California.

On Thursday, she opened the morning ceremony at the Newport Beach Public Library as nearly 100 authors, principals, school board members and students gathered for breakfast.

On the table in back was a cake honoring the festival’s 10th anniversary — with an illustration from Dr. Seuss’ “Green Eggs and Ham” in frosting on the top.

“My goal is to connect kids with books, and what better way than to connect them to the authors who created the books?” Hansen said.

Throughout the day, authors stopped at 24 Newport-Mesa schools to make presentations.

Dow Kump, the author of the adventure novel “Project-00,” showed Adams Elementary School students a cartoon version of his story, in which two teenage brothers crash-land in the Pacific Ocean and find themselves embroiled in a top-secret military experiment.

The key to writing a great story, Kump told the students, was to grab the reader instantly.

“Next time you have a writing assignment from your teacher, try pulling your teacher in from that opening sentence,” he said. “It can be done.”

Georgette Baker, who co-wrote the photographic narrative “We’re Off to the Galapagos,” went to California Elementary School with a number of artifacts from her travels — including ceramic models of native animals, a four-stringed instrument and a purse made of iguana skin.

First-grader Isabelle Cruz, 7, who attended Baker’s presentation, said she relished the experience.

“I’ve always wanted to be an author and illustrator, so I always thought it would be fun to meet an author,” she said.