Riverview Stories

The Riverview School Artists in Residence Project is underway! The adventure has begun.

I enjoyed the warmup session with the teachers on the third of their start of year professional development days. The energy was interesting - professional but playful. The story we created together is rough. It had to be, we didn't have enough time for anything but rough, but it does have all the components I'm hoping for in this project,  local setting - the skate bowl in Pickering Street, students as characters and some local flavour.

 

Skate Bowl from Google Street View in Hayden St, Riverview

It was good watching the teachers working out how to have a bit of fun with the process. One way was their choosing students who had been a little challenging for them last year as the characters in their story. I got so much pleasure out of seeing their linocuts and look forward to putting them together with the text of the story on the project blog.

Stories of place are such an important part of community and cultural development. We all live in place and are shaped by place. Our stories are shaped by place and our stories shape our places. Telling stories about our places helps us take pride in our country, our town and in ourselves.

The four introductory storytelling and story creation sessions in the library with the whole of school were rich and textured. Most of the sessions went well although the years 4,5,6 year session didn't get off to as good a start as I would have wished because the Queensland Times journo and photographer had arrived just before the start.

I'm looking forward to meeting with the four participation classes this week and working with them to develop their stories.

Daryll

Bringing Back the Magic

Really looking forward to presenting my workshops at the Bringing Back the Magic Conference down the Gold Coast in a couple of short weeks time. Should be fun.

Hope so anyway because that's partly what the workshop is about - reminding Early Childhood Workers that one of the easiest ways of having Bringing Stories Alive for children is to have fun.

I was at the Fortitude Valley Centre today telling stories and had a wonderful time. Mind you I was a little concerned about the very young children because the three, four and five year olds were laughing so loudly that the little's were wondering what was going on.

After the show one of the boys came up and said, "Can you come back tomorrow?"

I had apologise and tell him that I was sorry, I couldn't because I telling at a library tomorrow.

He said, "Well when can you come back?"

I said, "Friday," knowing that it would be another group on Friday.

"Oh, I don't come to kindy on Friday, could you come tomorrow?"

Here's the workshop description for Bringing Back the Magic :

Bringing Stories Alive by Daryll Bellingham – having fun with stories and storytelling’ in a hands on and entertaining way is an essential skill for all early child hood educators. This workshop will remind you how easy it is to involve your children in rich storytelling experiences whilst also touching on a selection of other activities that may include improvising new stories, adapting nursery rhymes, creating local place stories, telling personal and family stories, putting children in charge, effective story time planning and addressing story time issues.


Have fun,

Daryll

Storytellers' Names

Had the pleasure of performing at two Sunshine Coast C&K prepreps today - Kawana Waters and Buderim.

I love the pre-prepers at this time of year. They're just as excited but they are so intelligent.

At Kawana I told 'Rosie and the Whale' (one of my stories), 'Captain Parrot' (an improv. on my basic Captain Hook story) and 'The Very Clever Turtle' (an adaption of a folk tale from Ghana). At Buderim I told - 'Mary Had a Little Lamb (one of my stories based on the nursery ryhme),'The Baby Tyrannosaurus Rex' and an audience directed improv called 'Barbie and the Frog Prince'.

One of the children asked where I got my stories from and, when I said, 'Books, Grandparents and other storytellers' wanted to know the names of some of my storyteller friends. I obliged of course an even mentioned some of my Facebook storyteller friends. I had expected that some of them might have heard of Facebook but none had.

Community Story creation event at West End Live

Really looking forward to the community story creation session called
Lizard Tales at West End Live on Saturday 3rd October, 2009

Initiated by Sophie Chapman and now part of the Brisbane Festival's West End Live event, you are invited to come and have some fun creating some new West End stories. Can you imagine what 'The Lizard' might get up to if it woke up and had a walk around West End? Would it meet Kuril the local Indigenous totem in Kurilpa its home? And what would Kuril, the water rat think? Would it go for a climb up Stefan's tower or get a haircut from Phil the Barber?

You'll be able to watch the stories being transformed into illustrations by local artist Emmanuel Hernaez.

Lizard Tales Saturday 3rd October, 2:00 pm to 3:30pm.

The Sorcerers Apprentice on 10" 78RPM

Hey, Baby Boomer storytellers, want some childhood nostalgia? Go to http://www.kiddierecords.com and there you will find downloadable copies of those records parents used to buy their kids. I've noticed quite a few I recognise so I must have scored with Christmas or birthday presents a number of times.

'The Sorcerer's Apprentice' was published and sold as a 10" 78RPM album with Milton Cross as the narrator. I remember loving and hating it as a kid in front of the beautiful old radiogram. It could be a bit scary if you were listening on your own in the half dark.

Paul Gallico's 'Snow Goose' was another I recognise. The sound quality is very familiar although I'm sure ours got progressively scratchier with time.

Could make a quite interesting retro-audio resource for teaching etc.

Tomato Stories

Stories at Parties

Really enjoyed one of those end of year catch up parties yesterday at Getano and Rae's house. It had everything you could ask for really - old friends, new acquaintances, barbque, bocce in the backyard, music, singing and drumming. A good time was had by all, well, almost.

There was a three and a half year old boy there, the only boy and the only one of his age. You could tell that being with adults really wasn't as good as it could be.

I was impressed by the way he joined in with various percussion instruments as we jammed and sang but he really came alive when Getano suggested I tell a story. I told my 'Little Blue Train and the Ghost Story' and the transformation in Rohan was immediate and joyful. Now the shakers could be used for train noises - yes! Now he join in with the story and the smile on his face was so infectious.

Whereas previously I had been a friendly stranger, now I was the provider of a story just for him.

It was a good reminder of how important it is to be really inclusive. So thank you Getano and Rae for the party and thank you Rohan for the reminder.

Entertaining Storytelling Guild Lounge Telling

Mmmm - another Storytelling Guild Lounge Telling. They really are a very sane and entertaining way to spend an afternoon and evening. We lots of shared lots of 'bring a plates', shared conversation, shared stories and shared laughs. The world would be in a much better way if it spent more of its time in Lounge Tellings.

One of the highlights was a visiting storyteller from Sweden - Kerstin Thuresson. She regaled us with Swedish Folktales mostly - some we knew and some we didn't but it was all great fun.

She said:

"I mostly do performances in different culture houses, stages and festivals all over Sweden. I love folktales from all around the world and I'm extra fond of those who have a bit of humor in the end. I do also love the stories from India. I sometimes tell what we call Life Stories: screamingly funny things that has happened to me in my own life, a bit extra salted/spiced. I also do a special performance with stories about strong women on the International Women Day every year.

I’m the secretary of the non-profit association of Storytelling on the West Coast of Sweden. Comparable to your Guild, I think.

The Swedish storytellers are organized in approximately 8 geographic non-profit associations. An these associations are organized in one national association: Storytelling Net Sweden, an approximate translation. We have two big festivals every year, the biggest a week long in June every year is also the oldest and they celebrates 20th anniversary 2009, the second one has ran for four years and lasts over a weekend."

It's good to know that storytellers are so well organised in Sweden. If you are interested in Guild events the best way is to visit the blog and join the Guild and the email list.

Story Props

I use props a lot in my stories, not all stories mind you, but I do think that they add to the story and storytelling. Three questions come to mind - why? what? and how?

Here's a why list:
• props can enrich and add layers to stories
• props suggest - characters, places, actions, cultures
• props can make storytelling easier and more enjoyable for teller and audience
• props are often light and fun
• they usually add variety and can add surprise

From my point of view, a prop is only worth using if it enhances the story or the telling. They are a bit like the pictures in the picture book, only partly mind you, because it is really the storytellers voice, language, expression etc that really creates pictures for audiences.

What?
Well, first of all, my props have to fit into my prop box - my old tin trunk, which often functions as a prop itself. It becomes a pirates treasure chest very often, even if I don't tell a pirate story.

Next I prefer multi-functional props. One of my favourites is my whirly, a length of corrugated plastic pipe, which is usually the wind but there are so many stories, traditional and improvised, where the wind is useful. It's the wind blowing around the rigging in my pirate stories or the wind blowing around the mountain in 'Dragon Girl' or the wind blowing around Thomas Rhuag's cottage in 'The Seal Catcher'. It can be other things however. It becomes the sky god in 'Osebo the Leopard'. This is a really good example of the usefulness of a prop. I think it provides a better and more impressive description of a sky god than any words I might try.

One of the interesting thing about props is that, if they are any good, then they soon become multi-functional. My tambourine is a good example. It's perfect for Christmas stories especially any story where some one sings 'Jingle Bells'. It didn't take me long to find other uses for the tambourine. It makes a pretty good crash of waves or a splash.

Props are even more useful if they suggest things other than the obvious. An African drum suggests Africa and is Osebo the Leopards drum which the other animals try to get. Chinese bells or cymbals suggest China and make a really good start to a Chinese story. I stretch this to a Vietnamese story or a Tibetan (sorry I would if I told one) or an Indian story. I further stretch their use to suggest - 'some thing magical', 'the Fairy Queen' etc.

How
As loathe as I am to suggest a recipe, I going to suggest 'use sparingly' is an appropriate direction. I don't want to become any more of a 'props roadie' than I already am.

A second direction might be - 'the younger the audience the more useful they become'. This is particularly so because really young children might not follow all of your words but can find a prop like a train whistle and shaker accompanying a train story a lot of fun. They will also enjoy glove puppets especially with good sounds and songs.

A third direction might be - 'use them cleanly and efficiently'. Mucking around with props is really distracting. Put them down when you're not actually using them and pick them up cleanly when you do.

My Favourite Five
1) my tin trunk
2) my kookaburra (painted ply wood - thank you Suzanne Holman) so far only one story
3) blue shaker and wooden huon pine train whistle from Salamanca Markets
4) bag of hats and caps - 'Caps for Sale' and plenty more
5) my Djembe - so African, so much energy and fun - lots of stories

What's your Favourite Five list of props?

Daryll Bellingham

Living Library

Well we got back from Deniliquin in time to work on the latest Brisbane City Council Living Library project that Karen has been helping to organise. This time it was at Garden City Branch Library in their community meeting room.

I find the Living Library concept quite brilliant. The whole idea is to create a safe place where you can listen to stories that you don't normally hear from people you don't normally meet.

This Living Library was relatively small to fit the size of the community meeting room. We had 10 living books on quite a range of topics available. There was someone speaking about her mental illness, another about being a heart recipient, somebody else about his conversion to Islam .......

The Living Library concept began in Denmark with the first event at the Roskilde Festival in 2000. Since then it has been spreading around the world. You can find their web site at living-library.org . The first in Australia was initiated in Lismore and now both Brisbane City Council and Redlands Library Services have run them as well.

What can you do with your living book? Well you can't take them home or damage them. What you do is basically get comfortable and listen respectfully to your 'Books' story and ask questions. At the end of your borrowing period you say goodbye and thank you and maybe 'borrow another book' and listen to another fascinating story.

It's a quite unique opportunity to sit and listen to an Aboriginal Elder talking about growing up in Cherbourg or a young Muslim woman talking about head scarves or a transsexual person giving a really good run down on how she advocates for the community - all in the one safe place. Yes, I know, you see some of these sorts of stories on TV but these are real live people telling real live stories.

Next time hear about a Living Library stop and sit down for 40 minutes or so. Your life won't be the same ever again.

Sweet Stories in the Pop

Greetings from Deniliquin. Karen and I are having a break from the big smoke and visiting family in country New South Wales.

Not that I've been idle mind you, I've been taking some time to update my website.

In the process, I came across the 'Sweet Stories in the Pop' project I did with Alex McCallum and Karen Tunny and one of the Radio Lollipop Mater Children's Hospital support teams in Brisbane.

It was such a sweet project - telling stories over Radio Lollipop and visiting the wards telling and creating stories with children in the wards.

I just enjoyed reading one of those stories 'Jimmy Makes a Wish'. Hope you'll enjoy its fresh, young innocence as well.

West End Digital Story Spaces Project

Readers of my austories blog might be excused for thinking that I only tell stories to, or with, children - far from it.

Our current project with the West End Community Storytelling Group - West End Digital Story Spaces - is now well underway. We've got the blog 'West End Stories' working well now with both text, maps and podcast entries complimenting each other.

We'll be adding lots more stories of course but, if you could visit the blog and make some supportive comments, our participants, many of whom have a mental illness or an intellectual disability, would appreciate it.

We've been making use of the free services of podomatic for our podcasting recordings and our next step will be to set up both YouTube and MySpace sites to get some video up and running.
If you could visit our westendstories podcast site and 'become a fan' 'join the mailing list' or 'record a comment' that would be great. You can tell your friends we'll be adding lots more podcasts and vodcasts as the project continues.

In the mean time, I thought you might like to have a listen to a story about one of our West End Story Spaces - the old Tristrams Factory that became the West End Markets building.

Special Persons Day and Clean Hands

Two shows today and both were at C&KA Kindergartens with pre-preps. One was back to a centre I hadn't been to for a few years so it was nice to get back there and find most of the same warm, friendly staff were there with a new director. Dinosaurs were big so my 'Baby T-Rex Story' had a good outing. It was good to see the wonderful dinorama that had been created in one of the rooms. One of the sign of the times however was the reqirement to carefully wash my hands with a full on detergent wash outside the kinder to avoid bringing in any peanut residues into the centre.

The other centre was having a 'special persons day' and it was great to be immersed in the really positive family and community feeling of the day again. One grandmother had seen me perform at one of these four other times. We seemed like old friends. 'Grandpa Chris went catching fish', 'Dragon Girl' and a fun filled improvisation set at the beach made up the bill.

Guardian Angels by the Seaside

Spent the morning in the company of Angels today - Prep and Year One students at Guardian Angels Primary in Bay Terrace at Wynnum. They had opted for this week as their Book Week and the library was full of Book Fair so I got to perform in their class rooms.

There was a good energy at the school so we had some fun with stories. Generally I told two and improvised one and usually tried to keep these to stories about the bay and the area and to make sure they were lots of fun. This is when knowing a local area comes in handy. You can easily add specific detail to a setting or, perhaps even better, ask a question that allows your audience to add good detail.

An example of this is the story about year 1 students going on excursion down to the bay. As they walked down the hill they saw a pelican come skidding in across the water to land. Twice the pelican plunged its beak into the water, caught a fish and swallowed it. The third time though it caught a sand shoe full of old bones and a map, a treasure map. Of course the children had to follow the map and when they did the pelican followed them. They went along the foreshore to the old wading pool a favorite spot for all local children. It was nice to be able to ask, "Is there a slippery slide in the middle of the pool now?" and have them show off their local knowledge, "Yes, they built a new one."



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(Here's the wading pool in the middle of its refurbishment.)

They found the treasure at the bottom of the wading pool but when they opened up the treasure chest, it was the pelican that filled its beak and flew off with it.

Another of the local interest points is the mangrove board walk so that had to be in a story as well. Because we were talking about pets (I'd told one of my pet stories 'Socks the Kitten'), the leash free dog exercise area was offered by the children as an important detail.


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I did wonder momentarily whether or not the idea of a T-rex's eyeball hanging in a spider web was a good idea or not, after all, I'd never seen either a Trex or one of its eyes anywhere near the board walk, but who am I to get in the way of a good story idea? Needless to say, Jack was saved from the T-rex and his favourite dog Rover helped. The children did think it was a good idea to tell the story at other schools so I think I might just do that.

From angels by the seaside come very salty stories. So thank you Guardian Angels for asking me to perform as part of your book week celebrations.

Ali-Curung Catch Up

Spent some pleasant time yesterday with four women artists from Ali-Curung in the Northern Territory on Saturday. We had met them all in Ali-Curung when we were up there doing digital stories earlier this year. They were in Brisbane because the Footsteps Gallery in Anne Street in the city was hosting an exhibition of Ali-Curung Art.

One of the DVD's of digital stories we created in Ali-Curung was projected at the exhibition opening as was the video of the opening of their own art gallery this year.

We took them down to the West End markets, ate Spring Rolls and Curry Puffs under the fig trees and took photos by the river. We heard stories of course about what's been happening in Ali-Curung since we were there and what stories they would like recorded.

So if you would like to see some visual art with soul and story drop along to the Footsteps Gallery in the old School of Arts Building in Anne Street in the city.

Book Week 2008

Had a great first day of Book Week performing at Kurwongbah State Primary with lower school students today. The library was really buzzing with classes all day so I was performing in the 'hall'. It was huge but pretty good acoustics so it was a reasonable venue. It really reminded me that the ideal venue for a storytelling session is one that gives the audience a snug fit.

Because of the Olympics teachers were keen for me tell stories from a range of different countries and just tell to encourage a love of stories and storytelling which, for a storyteller, seems just perfect. Ended up telling quite a few stories that had gold in them - not surprising I suppose with all that questing for gold happening in Bejing.

The Fuel Your Mind theme seems to be taken up with enthusiasm by teachers and librarians. So far my prize goes to one of the classes at St Patricks in Emerald. They had constructed a 'petrol pump' full of books that lit up with party lights when you inserted the nozzle into the tank of a 'brain shaped car'. As students pushed the nozzle into the tank, the car lit up, the wheels whizzed around and the movement activated eyes flashed on and off and looked from side to side. Thought that was cool.

Sam and the Shipping Container

Sam lives in Emerald, a growing town in the middle of Queensland. One of his favourite places is the top of the old reddish-brown shipping or cargo container which sits in his backyard.


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Sam likes climbing up there, sitting quietly and watching the clouds float across the sky or hearing the cockatoos fly screeching home to their nearby roosting tree.

One afternoon after school, Sam had climbed up on top of the cargo container again and was listening to two girls talking in one of his neighbouring yards.

"Hey yah, what're ya doing on the weekend?"

"Dad said we can take the jet skis out to Fairburn Dam. Want to come?"

"Oh cool, I'll come," said Sam.

"Go away Sam. Stop listening to us. Anyway you can't come because you haven't got a jet ski - ha!"

"I don't care," said Sam but he did. He jumped off the shipping container and kicked his football as hard as he could. It slammed into the rubbish bin near the fence and knocked it over.

Sam stomped into the house slamming the screen door as he went. He sprawled onto the lounge chair and turned on the TV.

"What's wrong Sam?" said his Mum.

"Nothing."

Sam's Mum came into the lounge room and gave him a hug.

"You know Sam, sometimes you have to wait a little bit to get what you want."

"What do you mean Mum?"

"Well inside that shipping container you like to climb on is ...."

"What Mum?"

"... a jet ski."

"Ohh. Sick! Can we go out to Fairburn Dam on the weekend?"

"Nope. Sorry. You'll have to wait a bit longer because we're still saving up for the trailer."

"Ohhh, Mum."

"Don't worry Sam, we'll soon have enough money to buy the trailer and we'll be able to go jet skiing out at the dam."

But Sam couldn't wait and as he watched TV he hatched a plan. That night when everyone was asleep, he snuck down the hall, carefully lifted the keys off the hook in the hall and silently walked outside to the shipping container. He tried the keys in the padlock until one turned and the hasp clicked open. Sam carefully swung the container door open, hoping it wouldn't squeak too much.

He flashed his torch inside and there amongst the cardboard removalist boxes was a large wooden crate and on the side was the stencilled outline of a jet ski - "Yes!"

Sam stayed up the whole night dismantling the crate. The jet ski looked wonderful but Sam had a problem. How was he going to get it to the dam? It took Sam quite a while to think of a solution. He had to climb up on the roof of the cargo container and jump off three times before he remembered that his friend Joel liked go-carting. He ran as fast as he could over to Joel's place and knocked on his window, "Joel. Joel. I want to borrow your go-kart."

"Huhhhhh, what?" yawned Joel?

"Wake up Joel. I want to borrow your go-kart."

"What will you give me to play with. Have you got an x-box?"

"What about my new laptop. It's got some great games and I've got three DVDs you can watch."

"Cool. Here's my helmet. Be careful."

"Don't worry. I will. Thanks."

Sam pushed Joel's go-kart at least two blocks away before he started it. 'Raaaa, raaaa, raaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.' Off he went driving down the back streets towards his house. He turned the ignition off before he got near the house and coasted in silence down the driveway and stopped near the shipping container.

"Sick. All I need now is a trailer. What can I use?"

Sam used the side of the wooden crate and to the bottom he screwed his skateboard on one end and two of his sister's roller blades on the other end. Then he tied the jet ski to his trailer with five ockey straps and tied the trailer to the go-kart. He put on the helmet, started up the go-kart and roared down the driveway and out of the street before his parents woke up.

"Yahoooooo! We're off to ski at Fairburn. Yes!"

Soon Sam ran out of back streets and had to drive on the main road towards the Dam, going as fast as he could. He felt great as the farms sped by and he got closer and closer. Well he felt great until he heard the sound of a police siren behind him. Sure enough there was a police car driving along beside him. The red and blue lights were flashing and an angry looking police man was telling him to stop and pull over.

Sam knew he had to pull over. The police man hopped out of his car and "Right young Sam. You're in trouble."

"Trouble? Why? I was just going jet skiing out to Fairburn Dam. Everyone goes out there."

"Yes Sam but not everyone tries to do it with an unregistered go-kart and an illegal trailer. You'll have to leave it here and come back to your parents with me."

"Ohhhh!"

"Don't Ohhhh me Sam. Get into the police car you little squirt!"

Before Sam could unbuckle his seat belt he heard, "Base to highway patrol one, Base to highway patrol one, there's an emergency at Fairburn Dam. Two jet skis have collided in the middle of dam. Attend immediately to help in rescue!"

"Rescue!" said the policeman, "I can't swim!"

"I can," said Sam, "I got my bronze certificate in lifesaving last year. I'll help."

He started up the go-kart, "Ra, ra, raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!" and went speeding as fast as he could along the road to Fairburn Dam.




When he got there, sure enough, he could see the two jet skis out in the middle of the dam and holding on for dear life were the two girls.

Sam went speeding through the car park and down the boat ramp. He hit the brakes and spun the steering wheel as fast as he could. The trailer spun around and the jet ski slipped off from under the ockie straps and into the water with a splash. Sam jumped off the go-kart and onto the seat of the jet ski. "Reeeeeeee, reeeeee, reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh!" He was off speeding across the dam towards the crash scene.



"This is fun. Yehhhh!"

Sam steered the jet ski around the two girls and helped them both onto the back of the ski. Slowly this time, he headed towards the shore.

As he got back, people were cheering, "Yey Sam. Good one!"

Waiting for him beside the police car were his parents. "Good one Sam. We're proud of you. Your our hero but .........

............ you're grounded for 3 months."

Sam spent a lot of time on top of that shipping container for the next 3 months but at least the girls he rescued spoke to him sometimes.

('Sam and the Shipping Container' was created by Daryll Bellingham and the Year 4 and 5 students at Emerald State School on 13th August, 2008 ©)(Photos with thanks from www.ausiecampovenforum.com and flickr download photographer - QbiT)

Stories from Emerald North - 1

Doing a nice project this week in schools around Emerald. First up was Emerald North State School with P - 4 students. It's been a good day telling and creating stories in the phys ed room. One of the pleasures was creating a new story based on one of the folk tales from China I told - 'Ming Li and the Tortoise'. In the story the tortoise had a special mark on its head so I thought a story about an animal that one would normally find in Emerald but had a special mark on it would be a good start for a story.

The students decided that a Bearded Dragon subject for the story and we began. Here's the story:-

The Emerald Dragons

Emerald is a nice place to live. There's plenty of work for parents and the children can play lots of sport. One day some children were kicking a football around at Emerald North School and one of the boys said, "Hey! Want to play a game that my Dad used to play when he went to school?"

"What's it called?"

"Force-em-back. You see there are two teams. One team kicks the ball to the other and if they catch it on the full they can advance 5 steps and kick it back but if they don't they have to kick it from where they stop it. Eventually one of the teams is forced right back to the fence and they lose."

Well that's what they did. The game was going fine until one of the kicks went so high it went right over the school fence. No one knows whether there was a sudden gust of wind or what but that ball flew over the neighbouring houses towards the river with the team in hot pursuit.

They saw it flying over the trees and thought, "Oh no someone is going to have to swim for it."

When they got to the river bank however, the ball wasn't floating on the water or anything. They could see it anywhere. All there was in sight was a bearded dragon sitting on a log.

One of the girls said, "That bearded dragon looks a bit strange. It's got marks on its back."

"Maybe the ball landed on it's back and left those marks. They look like the marks of a football."

"No," said the girl, "The marks are on the inside. Hey I think the football has turned into a bearded dragon."

"Ha, ha! Don't be silly. How can a football be turned into a bearded dragon?"

"Yeh. I know but let's pretend. We'll take it back and pretend it's the football. Should be a laugh."

Well that's what they did. They picked up the bearded dragon and took it back to the school fence and said, "Sorry it took so long but the ball turned into a bearded dragon and we'll have to kick it instead."

They held it up and pretended to kick it but the bearded dragon flew from their grasp went sailing up into the air and down towards the other team.

'Catch it! Catch it!"

As the bearded dragon bounced the whole team dived on it and grabbed hold but they could not stop the dragon it flew up into the air with the students holding on. Higher and higher it went and they all went flying up and over towards the river.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Call the Principal! Call the teachers! Help!"

The other students ran into the office and called out "Emergency! Emergency! The kids have disappeared! "

Admin dialed 000 and it wasn't long before there was police, ambulance and fire brigade in attendance. Every headed down towards the river and started searching for the missing students. They couldn't find them any where. Once the police and fire brigade had gone home however, the students saw 10 little bearded dragons sitting on a log. They took them back to the school and fed them all their favourite foods - pies, sausage rolls, chocolate and ice cream - and eventually they started to grow slowly back into children again. Do you know what though, every single one of them had long skinny finger nails and marks on their backs like football laces.

It's not surprising, I suppose, that no one plays 'Force-em-back' at Emerald North School these days. They do take special care of bearded dragons though.

Here's where it all happened -
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(Story created by Daryll Bellingham, Storyteller and students from year 1b/2a at Emerald North School, following a Chinese folktale about a magic tortoise with a special mark on its head.)

A 'Young and Active' Challenge

Two show day and both of them were at two of my regular kindergartens with younger pre-preps. At the second of the centres, the staff were clearly a bit concerned that I would not be able to entertain the children well enough so that they would sit for 45 minutes. They were proposing two stories inside and a third outside as a roving story.

Now, although I was interested in the possibility, I wasn't too keen for a number of reasons. One is that outside shows have a completely different sound projection challenge and I am so used to telling inside. A second reason is that an inside show means that it is reasonably straight forward setting up and maintaining a structure useful for storytelling. Once you go outside or are moving around, you become more a people movement manager than a storyteller. A third reason is that my public liability insurance is quite vague about my coverage when performing outside and I don't really like to stretch it that much.

Really though, I was slightly miffed that they thought I couldn't entertain young children for 45 minutes at a stretch. After all, I've been doing just that for years.

I did think to ask if they had any special needs children and it turned out they did. Their needs were undiagnosed but did relate to short attention span and wanting to be physical. Well forewarned I took up the challenge and I'm glad I did. The 'special needs' children were pretty easy to spot and between my storytelling and the care and support of the staff. Every single child stayed for the whole 45 minutes and enjoyed the show.

I told 'The Little Blue Train Goes to the Beach' one of my settling down stories, 'The Old Man and the Drum' with lots of clapping and animal noises and 'The Wheels On the Bus' which starts off with the familiar song and improvises an ending with the audience that usually involves a grandpa that snores on the bus but catches the bank robber. I told with one eye and ear on the 'special needs' children and one on the general energy level of the whole group. My aim was to make sure that they had fun, got to be physical with out going over the top or changing the story and had a good variety of quite calm times and noisy expressive ones.

When I left the staff were happy with the result and so were the kids - mission accomplished.

Wednesday 30th July - old stories - new stories

Had a great session today out at Samford State School with one of the year 5 classes. It was a workshop in how to create new stories for telling.

Of course I started by telling a story. One of the things I found interesting was that they chose 'a Scottish story' when I offered them a choice of Australian, African or Scottish story to start with. I told them a version of one of the traditional selkie stories 'Thomas Rhuag the Seal Catcher'. (Thank you to Moses Aaron for first sharing the story with me. I loved telling the story as 3-up with you and Nicole at the SA National Storytelling Festival.)

After that I told an Australian story - one created at a Literary Festival in Springsure some years back - 'The Gingie Silos'. The good thing about telling this one is that students realise that they might be able to create a dramatic tell-able story themselves.

Once our year 5's realised that, we were away creating a brand new story about something they knew a reasonable amount about - their local area.

One thing that I enjoyed was drawing on my own childhood experiences having picnics in the Samford Valley. It really made describing the local setting both easy and a way of sharing the experience of creating the story with the class. We became a creative team because we shared knowledge of that setting.

I'm looking forward to hearing what adventures the four different teams came up with.