Unplug & Explore Creativity and Nature with The Plug In Series Kids Activity Books

Encourage your kids to unplug from their digital devices and plug into their imaginations with the unique Plug Into activity books. Whether your kids are budding nature lovers or want to explore their creativity, the Plug Into activity books will keep your kids or grandkids engaged with different fun activities, puzzles and prompts on each page.

“The Plug Into” series are the brainchild of local graphic designer Kim Carty who created these books for her own kids after not being able to find the types of activity books she wanted to buy for them. There are two books available for kids: The Plug In Your Imagination and Plug Into Nature.

Plug into your Imagination

This book contains educational activities to inspire and encourage young creative writers. It’s best suited to kids aged 7+. This activity book promotes kids imagination while boosting their confidence in writing in a fun and pressure-free way.

This book encourages creative writing using prompts to create characters, plot development and story starters. Kids can even create their own comic strip with a space to draw characters and fill in speech bubbles. 

It’s a wonderful book for kids to enhance their creative skills whether they already enjoy creative writing or need some inspiration.

Plug into Nature

This book contains fun and educational activities to inspire kids to connect with the natural world around them, whether that’s in the backyard, at a local park or creek or along a family walk.

This book is my favourite as it encourages kids to really engage with nature and biodiversity. It is filled with many different activities that kids can do both inside and out to learn more about ecology, flora and fauna.

Bring the book to the beach to identify different types of shells, or do a wildlife survey in your backyard or local park. If you have a pond close by, go dipnetting and see what kind of wonderful water bugs you can find.

There’s a page where kids can tick off the waterbugs they find and learn more about these creatures or even pick up leaves and categorise them.

It’s a great book that will get kids to observe and interact with the natural environment and is perfect as an unplugged activity.

The Plug In series makes a great present, whether you’re gifting one book or both. Both books are beautifully illustrated and printed on high quality paper (so that ink doesn’t bleed through).

Although these books are designed for kids, I would totally purchase an additional copy for myself to work through. It’s a great way for adults to disconnect too. The activities and illustrations in the Plug into Nature book are ideal for some adult colouring / meditation / mindfulness time.

The activity books are available to buy on The Creative Path website. You can also purchase them locally in the Harry Hartog Booksellers in Kotara Westfield and at the Taronga Zoo and Dubbo Zoo gift shops. They make fantastic birthday and Christmas gifts.

Newy with Kids wanted to learn more about the Plug Into book series. Here is our Q&A with Kim Carty, creator of the Plug Into book series.

What are your Plug Into Nature and Plug Into Your Imagination books about?

Our activity books encourage children to unplug from the digital world and plug in to their imagination and the natural world around them. The books have been designed to offer educational resources to children, parents and teachers that are visually inspiring, create curiosity, activate the mind and encourage children to learn while having fun.

The Plug into Nature activity book focuses on nature, biodiversity and the living planet. Children get an introduction to the world of Australian flora and fauna. If children open their eyes to connect more deeply with the world around them, they will discover, learn and connect with the wonders they experience in nature. This activity book has lots of fun activities to help children connect and learn about the natural world and engage more with the green spaces they visit.

The Plug into your Imagination activity book focuses on inspiring young creative writers. Whether you love creative writing or find it tricky, this book is for you! A fun educational resource that offers pages of story starters, scaffolding guides, persuasive writing, journalism, comic book and drawing activities that will keep children engaged and inspired to create their own world of stories and grow confidence in creative writing.

What age group is it for? Is it for kids or can adults do them too?

The activity books have been developed for use by primary school aged children, however are also suitable for adults. Plug into Nature includes many interesting facts about nature that the whole family can learn about. We love to see families get outside to explore the environment and nature together. Plug into Nature is perfect to take along on a family bush walk, a camping trip or to the grandparents house. There are lots of interesting and engaging activities to explore! All ages will learn new things from the activity books and you’re never too old to learn something new, right?

Tell us about yourself?

My name is Kim, I’m a graphic designer and the founder of a small start-up business based in Newcastle, NSW called The Creative Path.  We offer graphic design services and an on-line store featuring our two locally designed activity books. I have over 20 years experience in the design sector, with a background working across educational resource design and development. On this journey, I’ve gained insight into the world of education and the most effective ways to support our children to learn and grow in positive environments. 

When not working on design, illustrations or creating the next series of activity books in my design studio, I am happiest outside in nature with my 2 beautiful children and husband. Lots of beach time, nature, camping and bush walking recharges me and I also love reading and listening to podcasts.

Where did the idea of the The Plug Into activity books come from?

With inspiration from my two children I started the journey of designing activity books after I couldn’t find quality and engaging content in the market that my children would be inspired by! 

The first activity book I designed was Plug into your Imagination, the idea emerged when my 9 year old daughter Luka, who has a passion for creative writing was slowly piling up the pages of stories that she had began writing before quickly getting a new idea and moving on to the next story.

Starting to wonder what we were going to do with all these interesting and wonderful starts of stories, Luka and I had the idea to design a creative writing activity book and share these story starters with other children who might find starting a story tricky and give them the opportunity to continue and finish the stories in their own way. From there “Plug into your imagination” was born. 

Luka says that when she writes she feels free and the vision for Plug into your Imagination activity book was to share this feeling and create a resource that was visually inspiring that would encourage children to grow confidence in creative writing while having fun!

The design of Plug into Nature was the next activity book I would embark on. Again inspired by my family and the love of watching my husband Andrew who is a botanist teaching our children Luka and Jack all about the wonderful plants and animals we share our environment with.

The idea that unplugging from our digital devices and simply plugging into the natural world around us became an important message that I wanted to share with children. The idea that if we stop, listen and start looking we will discover amazing things that we have never seen before. So I started to design a fun and educational activity book focusing on nature and biodiversity that was visually inspiring and would help children to connect with nature and recognise that we play an important role in protecting our environment.

How long did it take you to create these books?

The activity books took me about a year and a half to illustrate, design and self publish. With a focus on supporting local businesses and our environment , they are proudly printed locally in Newcastle using sustainable materials. 

It was important to me to get the content and information accurate, so they are a beneficial resource for use in primary schools and for parents wanting engaging and education based activities. I worked closely with 3 professional primary school teachers who reviewed my books and provided feedback from an educational point of view. The help and advice from teachers, parents and students over that time was invaluable. I couldn’t have published these books without their insightful feedback. I have loved every minute of designing and refining these quality resources.

How can people purchase your books?

The activity books are available to buy on The Creative Path website. You can also purchase them locally in the Harry Hartog Booksellers in Kotara Westfield and in NSW at the Taronga and Dubbo Zoo gift shops. We have various stockists throughout Australia with a number of National Parks and Wildlife Services Visitor Centres stocking the books, along with independent toy stores and botanical gardens visitor centres.

Can the books be purchased as a group set for teachers or OOSH?

Yes! On our website we offer individual or class packs which are perfect for use in the classroom, OOSH or homeschool families.

What kind of feedback have you received about your books?

I have been overwhelmed with the positive feedback I am getting from parents, teachers and stockists who are buying the activity books. I’m so excited that people appreciate these books as much as I do and I’m enjoying hearing that children are loving them and activating their creative minds and are inspired to learn through the books.

Where is your favourite outdoor spot and why?

My favourite outdoor spot is the beach or anywhere by the water. As long as I can swim and soak up the sun, I am happy! 

Where are some local places that people could use the Plug into Nature book?

We are so lucky to live in Newcastle as there are many different places to get out and explore our environment with the Plug into nature activity book! 

You could explore the many rock platforms at our amazing beaches like Merewether and South Dudley Beach rock platforms. Any local creek or pond is a great place to learn about pond ecosystems and to go dip netting. Recently, we did a water bug survey in Waterdragon Creek next to Kotara Park. The children found lots of cool water bugs that fascinated them for hours! 

You can go for a bush walk and do a nature treasure hunt, carefully collecting special items to make into a nature mandala or use in art as a mindfulness activity.

Some of our favourite walks are the Bombala Track at Dudley and the Green Point walking track at Lake Macquarie.  You could even do a critter survey in your own backyard or take a night walk around your neighbourhood to observe what animals come out at night. You’ll have lots of fun with the activities encouraged in the book! 

What tips do you have for families wanting to explore more of nature?

I know as a parent that life can get very busy and its hard to find time.  However, I really encourage families to try to experience nature more regularly, taking time to notice the amazing plants and animals that we have around us in our every day lives.

Whether you walk the Yuelarbah track at Glenrock, the Bombala Track at Dudley, the boardwalk at Swansea or even just a walk around your neighbourhood or local park, there is always much to see as you slow down and observe the nature around you. 

We can all benefit from time to explore, discover and connect more with nature. It’s helpful to take time out from our busy lives to recharge the mind and body, appreciating the opportunity to hang out as a family and discover new things together. 

So my best tip would be to take the time to get out there and explore;  and of course wear sun screen, a hat and drink plenty of water! If going with kids, make sure you pack plenty of snacks and your Plug into Nature book of course!

You’ve created two books so far. Do you have more books in the pipeline?

Yes, my creative mind is full of ideas and educational activities that will be part of the “Plug into” series in the future. I am currently working on the next activity book and constantly talking to teachers to get ideas for resources that are needed in the classrooms.

We also have a series of creative writing posters on the website that are perfect to add some inspiration to the classroom walls and are working on adding downloadable activities to our website for teachers to use.

In addition to our books we are developing a biodiversity education program for primary schools and early education centres. Focusing on the flora and fauna in their surrounds and offering a personalised experience to connect and gain knowledge so that the children can form positive connections with the environment that they interact with every day. We are very excited to launch this education program in the future.

I’m passionate about my activity books and love designing them so be sure to keep checking our website for new books and educational resources coming soon. 

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