In her first public appearance since undergoing preventative cancer surgery, Angelina Jolie told an audience of children to embrace difference and the feeling of not fitting in.

The actress, 39, attended the 2015 Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards in LA this weekend, with two of her children in tow - Shiloh, 8, and ten-year-old Zahara.

She appeared genuinely delighted when she was named winner of favorite villain for her role in Maleficent.

Angelina recently penned a powerful essay on having her ovaries and fallopian tubes removed two weeks ago, after routine tests revealed that she was at heightened risk of developing ovarian cancer; the illness her mother died from aged 56.

And her acceptance speech at the Kids Choice Awards was no less rousing - in an entirely different respect - as she opened up about her misfit youth and urged an excitable audience of under-12s to "cause a little trouble":

'Different is good'; Angelina Jolie delivers empowering speech on being a misfit at the Kids Choice Awards