If you want to know a bit more, there’s an informative article here.

But really you just want (and need) a laugh, don’t you? So, I’ve collected the funniest You-Tube (or other) video clips I know and share them with you here. I wrote this post on a day in which i was feeling horribly stressed and anxious and I now have tears (of the right sort) pouring down my face.

Hilarious video of two cats playing, with clever voice overs from two guys.

Babies eating lemons, always good for a laugh.

As are babies laughing.

I love the videos of the talking alsation that Andrew Grantham makes. He very kindly gave me permission to use this one in schools in my anti-stress talks. And he has now done this one, just as good.

We all love the moonwalking Shetland ponies and I adore the new Evian advert.

But my favourite involve goats screaming like humans. The first bit isn’t sooo funny but it gets funnier.

And once you’ve seen that, you have to watch some of the Goat Edition songs – well-known songs with screaming goats inserted… I think my favourites are Taylor Swift and Bon Jovi. I even start laughing before the goats appear….

I’d love your suggestions in the comments below. Keep ‘em clean, please, as this is for schools, too.

The books must be well-written, with good review coverage (by which I do not just mean Amazon reviews but reviews from school librarians and other responsible agencies) and have been written within the last 15 years if possible. The topic must also be a major part of the book, not simply have a fleeting mention.

Here are the topics to cover and a very few book ideas of my own. I need loads more! If you have any you recommend, please add to the comments. Thank you!

Alcohol –

Wasted by NM;

Anxiety and panic –

Catalyst by Laurie Halse Anderson

Asperger’s -

Born on a Blue Day by Daniel Tammett (non-fic);

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon

Bereavement –

Ostrich Boys by Keith Grey; Life on the Refrigerator Door by Alice Kuipers; My Sister Lives on the Mantlepiece by Annabel Pitcher

Bullying –

Malarkey by Keith Grey; Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli; Run, Zan, Run by Catherine MacPhail

Cyber-bullying –

You Don’t Know Me by Sophia Bennett

Depression /mental illness –

Catalyst by Laurie Halse Anderson (over-achievement); So Much To Tell You by John Marsden; A Note of Madness by Tabitha Suzuma (bipolar disorder); Just in Case by Meg Rosoff (psychosis/paranoia); Stop Pretending by Sonya Sones

Divorce - 

Suitcase Kid by Jacqueline Wilson (bit young); Divorce Helpbook for Kids by Cynthia Macgregor (non-fic)

Drugs –

Junk by Melvin Burgess; Candy by Kevin Brooks

Dyslexia –

Whispers in the Graveyard by Theresa Breslin

Eating disorders –

Massive by Julia Bell; Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Forced marriage –

An (un)Arranged Marriage by Bali Rai 

Homosexuality / LGBT –

Wildthorn by Jane Eagland; Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan, How They Met by David Levithan

OCD – ?

Overweight -

Fat Boy Swim by Catherine Forde; Butter by Erin Jade Lange

Pregnancy / abortion -

The Opposite of Chocolate by Julie Bertagna

Rape, “date” rape -

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson; You Against Me by Jenny Downham

Relationships – love, sex etc

The Last Virgin by David Belbin; Rich and Mad by William Nicolson

Self-harm -

Red Tears by Joanna Kenrick

Social Anxiety Disorder / Social Phobia -

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Chbosky

Step-families

Young carers

NB I’d ALSO like novels with pure feel-good factor, novels that aren’t about “issues” but just for pleasure and light reading. Book chocolate! If you have book chocolate ideas, please give a few words to say what sort of book it is.

I’m looking for quotes that are short (2-3 lines long) and meaningful/interesting/empathetic. The sort of things that will show teenagers that we do understand, that we have been there, and that life got better (at least in terms of those adolescent stresses, even if those adolescent stresses were replaced with the very annoying adult variety.)

You can either comment below or email me at n@nicolamorgan.co.uk You are welcome to make more than one comment but if each comment could focus on one of these it would be great, so I can slot it into the relevant section.

Memories of:

• anger
• fear/anxiety
• sadness/depression
• sex/relationships
• getting into trouble/risk-taking
• feeling of self-consciousness eg about body
• any specific new feeling you remember about being a teenager
• a specific experience such as bullying

And/or:

• any tip for survival
• positive insight into adolescence

I think my underlying feeling about any period of stress is that how we feel today is not how we will feel next week/month/year. That now is not forever. That is the message I’m trying to convey, alongside a load of positive strategies and insights.

Can you help? Thank you! Everything will be confidential but please give me a name by which I should quote you – first name only and it can be made-up. Eg “Anne, 37.”

I’m also collecting quotes from teenagers. I’ll be putting a call out for those soon, though I have quite a few already. Teenagers might also like to fill in this anonymous online survey. All results to be used in the book.

Together, I believe we cane help.

Links for you:

My article on cyber-bullying on the Huffington Post UK is here.

And here is the news item I referred to about children bullying teachers online.

The CEOP (Child Exploitation and Online Protection) website has a wonderful series of videos, starting here, allowing viewers to make decisions and see what happens. I was gripped. I think these should be shown in all secondary schools.

The ThinkUKNow website is excellent, with everything split into different ages.

I received an email from an expert who said, “I am a regular visitor of your site and I really appreciate your efforts to increase awareness on serious Cyber Security issues like Cyber Bullying. We are also working on this subject and for that purpose we have recently interviewed Dr. Justin W. Patchin, Co Director of CyberBullying Research Center and author of top selling books on Cyber Bullying. The information he has provided in this interview is quite helpful for parents and I am sure your readers will simply love it.” So I’ve put the audio clip below or you can read the transcript by clicking here.

Source: Mobistealth

Following my point in the HuffPo article that some cyber-bullying is potentially defamation and a criminal offence, one of the commenters makes an excellent point, that school children should be taught about those laws that might directly affect them. I completely agree. They will pick some of it up anyway, but school rules are not enough – it’s the laws of the land children need to know something about. OK, so it won’t always make a difference but it will give them a different and important context for their behaviour.

I have also been sent some phenomenally practical information from a school in Derbyshire, where the adult in charge of CEOP (Child Exploitation & Online Protection) answered these questions:

This is the text of a guest post I wrote for Bubblecow as part of the mini-tour for Blame My Brain. I’ve reproduced it here, for all the writers who read my blog.

Voice – what a book “sounds and feels like” – is, essentially, glue. It holds the words together so that the book feels whole and strong; and it holds the reader to the page. If your voice slips, you break the spell that keeps the reader listening. That’s the same for fiction and non-fiction, but there are also differences.

1. Voice gives authority. In fiction, it makes the reader suspend disbelief, summons the authority to say, “You know I made this up but you will believe it as if it were true.” In non-fiction, the authority says, “This is true and you will trust me that it is so.” It is not enough for aspiring non-fiction writers to be expert in their subject-matter. They must also create an engaging voice which feels authoritative not just because of the information but also because of communicative quality of that voice. Because it is, for non-fiction especially, about effective communication.

2. In non-fiction, the writer is allowed to let his or her own voice be explicit. People usually say they hear my voice in my non-fiction but very rarely in my fiction. We are now – though not in previous generations – even allowed to say “I”. In fiction we are supposed to keep our views hidden or at least shroud them subtly within a character’s voice and not show whether we personally speak through that character or not, though the reader may like to guess. In non-fiction, we are allowed to intrude ourselves into the book, not just opinion but also timbre of voice. (This does depend to some extent what type of non-fiction we’re talking about.)

3. Non-fiction is just like talking, but with the leisure to edit our words to be more crystalline than they could be if we were actually talking. My aim is that the audience or readers know what I mean and enjoy listening to or reading it. I know they don’t want me rabbiting on self-indulgently so I search for a form of words that gets the message over and keeps them listening or reading. And I edit ruthlessly, killing my darlings if they get in the way of communication.

4. Moreover, the same elements work in a non-fiction voice as work for public-speaking: humour (when appropriate), clarity, organisation of material, occasional surprise, and eye contact. Yes, I try to feel I have eye contact; I try to imagine that I’m looking and smiling – or frowning, if appropriate…

5. With non-fiction, we must think specifically of the reader. Actually, I do that in fiction, too, but I do it even more in non-fiction. With non-fiction it’s all about getting the message to the reader, and you can’t do it if you don’t have a strong sense of that reader, tune in to their tuning in, know what they want to know and what they already know. Interestingly, for Blame My Brain, the intended readers are teenagers but adults seem to love it, too. But, then, teenagers are not a whole different species from adults and very often enjoy the same books. If I were talking to them face-to-face I wouldn’t do it much differently.

I think the key is being passionate about the subject but being equally passionate about getting the words right so that communication works. You know how people who are passionate about their subjects can often be appallingly boring to listen to, because they are so wrapped up in their subject that they’ve failed to tune in to the audience? And they don’t know when to stop? Well, that! Don’t do it!

And with that, I’ll stop.

I did a radio interview that morning and afterwards was walking along the wooden pathway, minding my own business and soaking up the atmosphere, when I heard fast footsteps clattering behind me. I stepped aside to let the person past and saw that it was a woman and, presumably, her son, aged about 12.

Turned out she was looking for me. “Where’s your book?” she cried, with crazy-eyed desperation. Despite the fact that I’d had a lot of books published by that time, somehow I knew she meant Blame My Brain. I’ve no idea how she knew who I was, but anyway.

By chance, at that moment, I could see the display of Blame My Brain on the other side of the square, occupying a stretch of shelving in the children’s tent. (The original cover was this gorgeously in-your-face-one, which I always liked.) I pointed her towards it.

The woman ran in that direction, shouting to her son, “Hurry! Or we might be too late!”

Now, I assume she meant late for an event, or late for a train, or late for tea with a grumpy aunt, but I had a mental image of her son’s brain, just on the cusp of becoming teenage, and her desperately needing the book before it exploded into adolescence!

Since then, I’ve had so much feedback – probably more emails than for any other book. One woman told me it rescued her relationship with her daughter. The teenage years can be so hard, but understanding what is happening, and why, takes so much of the stress away.

That woman’s son must be an adult now. I wonder if he remembers his mother’s desperation!

So, keen readers among you, can you help me? Can we help these young people become and remain keen and confident readers? This is about reading for pleasure, nothing else. And nothing is more important, reading-wise, tbh.

All these readers are 12 and you can assume that they’d like something fun and quick to get into. But let’s give them quality, eh?

Here’s what they want:

C likes the sound of: spy stories, space travel, books about animals and WEIRD things..

L is looking for: humour, murder mystery, teenage issues, and WEIRD things.

Ch is looking for: teenage issues, vampires, wolves, REALLY scary stuff and friendship. She enjoyed my novel, Deathwatch And she doesn’t mind whether it’s aimed at boys or girls or both. Hooray!

Z wants books with any of these things: ghosts, war, teenage issues, story from the past, gory things, monsters, fantasy, friendship, spy story, horror, dragons and wizards, witchcraft, space, sinister/dark, vampires/werewolves, nasty villains and WEIRD things. He would like a book aimed at boys. And he says he would especially like a book on vampires, werewolves and hybrid vampires and werewolves. Eeeeeeeeek!

So, people, what do you recommend?! (Edited to add: I should have said this before –  writers, please don’t recommend your own books. Also, books must be available in public libraries and/or bookshops, so not ebook only.)

At around 9.30am I’m being interviewed by Kaye Adams on Call Kaye, as a promotional thing for a programme later in the day – Medical Matters. On Call Kaye we will be talking about whether adolescence is more stressful for teenagers or for parents – interesting question! I know what I think. I think. I’ll blog about it afterwards.

People might call in. You might call in… Oh gosh, you so might. Please behave. Seriously. *frowns*

Then, at 13.30, there is Medical Matters, a whole programme on the teenage brain, which I was interviewed for a while ago. No idea what bits they’ll use and I can’t remember what I said anyway.

It’s not often the teenage brain gets a whole programme to itself so I’m looking forward to helping parents and teachers feel more reassured about the whole topic. Who knows, people might even decide they’d like to know even more and they might then buy Blame My Brain, in its lovely new edition, available now…

By the way, I’m also now a blogger for the Huffington Post UK, and have two posts going out this week, one on teenage stress and one on cyber-bullying. I’ll put links up once I have them. It’s very scary doing this, as once you post the article, that’s it. No going back and sometimes the comments can be, erm, trenchant.

Fingers crossed for everything!

By the way, a young friend of a friend, neither of whom I have met but you both know who you are, gave me a fab idea for another brain-related book the other day. I’ve suggested it to my agent and I will let you know what happens!

Edited to add: Just listened. The problem you will find is that you won’t know which bits were me and which were Professor Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, because each time they introduced us in the wrong order, and we were saying the same – mostly because Sarah-Jayne is my main scientific adviser! I’m the one with the lower voice.

Today I’ll answer Avril Luke’s question:

“What does practice makes perfect have to do with our brain and is it ever too late?”

“Practice makes perfect” is an old adage but we now know more of what the brain does that makes it true. We all have roughly 100 billion neurons (nerve cells) in our brains, about the same number as a newborn baby has. (We lose some from adulthood onwards, quite naturally and without harm, and there are also times when we grow some more, but this is not relevant to the practice makes perfect thing.) Now, obviously, a new born baby can’t do very much. But as a baby starts to try to do things (ie practise) the neurons grow branches (called dendrites) and make connections (synapses) with other neurons. (Actually these connections are not connections, but tiny gaps, but the gaps are small enough for the electrical messages to cross.) The more the baby practises, the more dendrites grow and the more complex and therefore reliable the neural pathways.

So, the baby learns to do things, by practising and thus growing connections between cells.

This process never stops. We can grow new connections at any age. It’s not just babies and children but all of us, forming connections between brain cells to make us better at things.

So, it’s never too late. The act of practising and trying (and failing) helps us become perfect by growing connections and strengthening them.

However, we do have periods of our life when learning new things is easier. (Actually, a few skills seem to require to be developed at certain young ages – sight and language, for example – but most skills can be learnt at any age, though with a bit more difficulty when we are older.) The years of childhood and adolescence offer the greatest opportunities for building strong neural networks and then pruning them to be efficient.

Childhood allows us to create the building blocks of certain aptitudes and skills. Adolescence gives us sudden growth in volume of grey matter (neurons and connections) which allows us to perfect those skills. If we try to learn a whole new skill as an adult – for example, a musical instrument – it will certainly not be impossible but it will be harder as we will have to create those building blocks from scratch.

But Dr Gary Small, author of iBrain, explains that it takes only 5 hours of intense practice of a new skill (in adults) to alter neural pathways, proving that no, it is never too late!