Hannah and Dean are best friends in High School. Dean isn't having the best day having missed his bus, late for class and didn't understand the work. To top it all off there is a new kid at school who wants to be friends with Hannah and Dean. Find out how Hannah and Dean deal with meeting a new friend.

City Kicks is a series of books designed specifically for teenagers and young people with learning difficulties and people with autism.

City Kicks books offer a unique opportunity for students of all levels to access the same stories, through the use multi-level story telling and the incorporation  of Widgit symbols.

​City Kicks books allow young people who read traditional text, emergent readers and young people who don't currently read text to access the stories. City Kicks is a series bridging the gap in the books and materials that are available to teenagers and young people with special needs.

By Carley McAdam & Nathan Battiste

City Kicks books are accessible to young people who don't read traditional text, emerging readers and more confident readers.

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Level 1

A single key word and symbol is provided on the top right to accompany the picture.

Symbolised communication boards are available as an additional resource as part of the workbook companion. The primary focus at this level is on identifying key words related to the story and their own lives.

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Level 2

A single simple sentence with up to 3 key words is presented at the bottom of the page under the picture, with both symbols and text. The books use simple sentence structure at this level, with familiar words that students can read using symbols and or text. Students reading at this level will be able to gain understanding from reading and recognising the symbols if not also being able to read the text. Sentences will follow similar grammatical patterns at this level and are always written in present tense.

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Level 3

Adjacent to the picture on each page is the level 3 text. This text is broken into short paragraphs. The sentence structure at level 3 uses compound sentences to enable students to begin to understand cause and effect. The conjunction 'because' is used in a sentence on each page to demonstrate cause and effect relating to the characters feelings and actions.