More schools join Little Birds than ever before!

Last year, Snail Tales received support from Arts Council East to create a set of story-making workshops that would help children in early Key Stage 2 become expert story creators.

Now nearly two years on, we have a fantastic workshop series that provides children with not just the ability to make strong creative work, but the enthusiasm to do so as well! On the face of it, it's like having a storyteller-in-residence for a week - but in practice, it's like having one for a year or more! Teachers and even parents have all commented on the benefits - from increasing literacy skills to building confidence. Read some of their comments at the end of this article...

This time round, we have been working extra hard to make Little Birds even more accessible for more schools, and even more long-lasting. Even though we visit your year 3 and/or 4 children for just one week, they and their teachers continue to receive our support right up to year 6 and beyond! For less than the cost of 2 days of the average storyteller's visit, your school could have:

• five 1-hour workshops for 2 groups of 30 children in early KS2 (years 3 and/or 4)
• access from home or school to LittleBirdsClub.com for all workshopped children and their teachers, until the end of ever
• NEW! One hour of twilight INSET with all your school's staff, training in storytelling techniques and ideas for the classroom
• help organising a local showcase for children to share their creativity with families
• The chance for your children's stories to become famous!

As before, there will be a theatre tour based on the stories created by Little Birds in the mini-residencies or on LittleBirdsClub.com - meaning any children who take part could see their tale made famous by professional storytellers on stage. And this year, our tour is going national! Watch this space for more details.

This week has seen more Little Birds getting creative in Elm Tree Primary School in Lowestoft, and Easton Primary School near Ipswich. Their stories are from about as far east as you can go in England, and just two weeks ago stories were coming from almost as south as you can go: from Waterside Primary near Southampton! These schools have joined our list of about 25 schools who have taken part in Little Birds this year - that's been almost one mini-residency every full school week since September!

To find out more, and make a booking for your school, just click here!

And here's that great feedback we mentioned...!

"Our children were given creative freedom in a supportive environment which allowed them to explore their own skills creatively and in a different way to the classroom environment."
- Literacy Co-ordinator, Spinney Primary School

"The children were engaged from the start of workshop 1 right up to the end of workshop 5. I will certainly continue to make reference to the work they've done in future lessons, especially in terms of confidence and the progression in story making. The whole project was thoroughly enjoyable and I would recommend it to others."
- Teacher, Class 5 (yr 5), Thomas Eaton Primary School

"Children are constantly being pushed to write to formula. But if they can get excited by a story, then they don't feel under pressure when asked to write it down... Your work always kicks off some excellent creative activity from my class."
- Yr3 teacher, St Philip's School

Don't delay: make sure you get in our diary before all the dates have been snatched up - or we realise just how small the price is, and change our minds! Click here for more information and to book now!

2010-05-14