Fay­ola Fras­er

Au­thor and sto­ry­teller Mary Cuffy has long been known for cham­pi­oning lit­er­a­cy in ear­ly child­hood. She is the cre­ator of the beloved La­dy­bug book se­ries, which in­cludes Lo­la and the Danc­ing La­dy­bugs, Lo­la and the Mag­ic Sticks, and Lo­la and the Fas­ci­nat­ing Co­coa Bean, as well as the recipe book Bake the Co­coa Cook­ie with Lo­la. In ad­di­tion to her writ­ing, Cuffy has lec­tured in the Cer­tifi­cate and Bach­e­lor of Ed­u­ca­tion in Ear­ly Child­hood De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Stud­ies pro­grammes at the UWI Open Cam­pus, and she con­tin­ues to en­gage young read­ers through her week­ly chil­dren’s col­umn in the Guardian.

As Cuffy turns 50, she steps in­to a new era marked not by age, but by pas­sion, grat­i­tude and re­newed pur­pose. For her, this mile­stone is both a cel­e­bra­tion and a mo­ment of re­flec­tion—on a life shaped by cu­rios­i­ty, cre­ativ­i­ty and a com­mit­ment to chil­dren. Guid­ed by the be­lief that learn­ing should feel like mag­ic, she has spent her life “nur­tur­ing chil­dren’s love for learn­ing, mak­ing school a place they ea­ger­ly an­tic­i­pate, and un­lock­ing their po­ten­tial through cre­ativ­i­ty.” At this piv­otal mo­ment, she shares her sto­ry not as a con­clu­sion, but as en­cour­age­ment for any­one chart­ing a path with heart and courage.

Cuffy’s pas­sion for lit­er­a­cy be­gan in her “won­der­ful child­hood in Trinidad and To­ba­go,” where pri­ma­ry school felt like a play­ground of dis­cov­ery. She re­calls the joy of singing songs, recit­ing rhymes and los­ing her­self in sim­ple vers­es that sparked imag­i­na­tion. Those ear­ly years were more than aca­d­e­m­ic—they were ad­ven­tur­ous, con­fi­dence-build­ing and trans­for­ma­tive. They plant­ed the seed of a life­long call­ing.

That child­hood de­light grew in­to a dis­tin­guished ca­reer. Cuffy has al­ways be­lieved that chil­dren thrive when learn­ing feels like play, a phi­los­o­phy that con­tin­ues to guide her work. Through her writ­ing for the Kids’ sec­tion, she pro­vides a plat­form for chil­dren to shine—show­cas­ing their sto­ries, draw­ings and ideas. Every ar­ti­cle is a com­mit­ment to mak­ing young read­ers feel seen, heard and val­ued. For Cuffy, el­e­vat­ing young voic­es is not a pas­time; it is her life’s vo­ca­tion.

At the cen­tre of her pro­fes­sion­al work is a de­vo­tion to nur­tur­ing a true love of learn­ing. She has spent decades en­cour­ag­ing chil­dren to see school as a space of ex­cite­ment rather than oblig­a­tion. But what fu­els her most to­day is her cur­rent re­search project, Un­lock­ing Lit­er­a­cy: In­te­grat­ing the Vi­su­al and Per­form­ing Arts to En­hance Lit­er­a­cy De­vel­op­ment in Trinidad and To­ba­go’s Ear­ly Child­hood Cur­ricu­lum. More than a schol­ar­ly study, she de­scribes it as “a quest to rev­o­lu­tion­ize how we teach read­ing and lit­er­a­cy,” root­ed in in­no­va­tion and dri­ven by a de­sire to trans­form how young learn­ers ex­pe­ri­ence read­ing.

Her re­search imag­ines class­rooms where lit­er­a­cy ex­tends far be­yond words on a page—where lan­guage comes alive through vi­su­al and per­form­ing arts. By in­te­grat­ing draw­ing, paint­ing, de­sign­ing, dra­ma, move­ment and mu­sic, chil­dren can in­ter­act with sto­ries in im­mer­sive, mean­ing­ful ways, whether act­ing out the words they read or paint­ing scenes from a book. Cuffy be­lieves this ap­proach shifts lit­er­a­cy from strug­gle to joy­ful dis­cov­ery, help­ing every child build con­fi­dence.

Her aim is to cre­ate learn­ing en­vi­ron­ments where chil­dren read be­cause they want to—be­cause read­ing feels like ex­plo­ration. By mak­ing lit­er­a­cy ex­pe­ri­en­tial, she hopes to bridge the gaps of­ten seen in ear­ly child­hood ed­u­ca­tion. She has wit­nessed first­hand how cre­ativ­i­ty can un­lock un­der­stand­ing, es­pe­cial­ly for chil­dren who feel dis­con­nect­ed from tra­di­tion­al teach­ing meth­ods. Her work push­es the bound­aries of what learn­ing can be: vi­brant, dy­nam­ic and in­clu­sive.

Look­ing ahead, Cuffy’s am­bi­tions ex­tend well be­yond acad­e­mia. She hopes to ex­pand arts-in­te­grat­ed lit­er­a­cy pro­grammes across Trinidad and To­ba­go and even­tu­al­ly through­out the Caribbean. She en­vi­sions re­gion­al cur­ric­u­la in­fused with cre­ativ­i­ty, of­fer­ing ed­u­ca­tors flex­i­ble tools to meet each child’s unique needs. Her plans in­clude com­mu­ni­ty out­reach, es­pe­cial­ly in un­der­served ar­eas, where in­no­v­a­tive pro­gram­ming can spark op­por­tu­ni­ties for chil­dren who need them most. Her dream is a fu­ture where “no child gets left be­hind, where school is a sanc­tu­ary of ex­cite­ment, and where pas­sions in­spire the next gen­er­a­tion of in­no­va­tors.” She al­so hopes to build part­ner­ships that em­pow­er ed­u­ca­tors with the train­ing and re­sources need­ed to bring this mod­el to life. For her, teach­ing is an act of em­pow­er­ment, and she wants ed­u­ca­tors to feel ready to “tai­lor learn­ing to every child’s unique rhythm.”

Turn­ing 50, Cuffy feels more en­er­gised than ever. She sees this mile­stone as a fresh chap­ter—proof that pas­sion, not age, fu­els bold dreams. Her ex­pe­ri­ences have taught her that every set­back is a step­ping stone, and every “no” is sim­ply a redi­rec­tion to­ward greater pur­pose. Like the rhymes of her child­hood, her jour­ney shows that cre­ativ­i­ty and per­se­ver­ance can open doors to end­less pos­si­bil­i­ties.

To par­ents, teach­ers and dream­ers, she of­fers this en­cour­age­ment: “Em­brace your pas­sions, nur­ture the young minds around you… share your sto­ries, ig­nite that spark, and let’s build a fu­ture where learn­ing is loved by all.”

Be­cause it is nev­er too late to make a dif­fer­ence. And for Mary Cuffy, the next 50 years promise even more in­spi­ra­tion, cre­ativ­i­ty and heart.