A typical public event consists of acting out (more or less word-for-word) four stories, and singing three or four songs (mostly from Donaldson's three albums of songs - The Gruffalo Song and Other Songs, Room on the Broom and Other Songs and The Gruffalo's Child and Other Songs).
Donaldson has also performed jointly with her illustrators, particularly Axel Scheffler and Lydia Monks.