The True Meaning of Crumbfest
‘Tis the season for telling my favourite story: The True Meaning of Crumbfest by David Weale. I got the chance to share this story from Prince Edward Island at tonight’s Heart and Soul Salon at the Salisbury Centre. It is the tail of one mouse’s brave quest to find–you guessed it–the true meaning of Crumbfest. [...]
The Power of Short Film
A well made short film is like a poem, it leaves room in it for the unfolding of many different stories. Vinko Totic, a soft-spoken man who knows first-hand the ravages of civil war has devoted his life to spreading peace and compassion. When I lived in Ottawa, I knew him best as a organizer [...]
Storylistening Podcast Added: Emily Dodd Speaks about Inspiring Children to Care about Seabirds
On a sunny Monday morning, I took a short train ride out to North Berwick to visit the Scottish Seabird Centre and talk to Emily Dodd about using storytelling in environmental education. When I arrived, a school group was just packing up their lunches after a fun-filled few hours at the Centre hearing stories, seeing [...]
Weird and Wonderful Fairly-traded Instruments for Storytelling
Yesterday I went out to the Scottish Seabird Centre to visit with Emily Dodd, their education officer. She uses storytelling in her work with school groups. In order to set the mood for stories, such as Percy the Puffin, she uses an ocean drum. You may be familiar with rainsticks–bamboo shakers filled with beads that [...]
Storylistening Podcast Added: Allison Galbraith on Storytelling and Climate Change
I caught up with Allison Galbraith when she hosted the Scottish Storytelling Centre’s March Storytelling Café. She had recently facilitated a workshop on storytelling with park rangers at a conference on climate change hosted by Scottish Natural Heritage. In this podcast, I ask her about the conference and about the role storytelling can play in [...]
The Scottish Seabird Centre Takes Environmental Storytelling On-line
The Scottish Seabird Centre in North Berwick has been experimenting with delivering environmentally-themed stories to schools over the internet. The stories, aimed at early years classes, focus on puffins and seals and other creatures that can be found in the Firth of Forth, especially on the islands that the Centre has webcams on. The stories [...]
Transition Tales at Emerson College
The twin specters of climate change and peak oil are offering us an “open moment.” In the face of an unknowable future, what stories will we tell to open a way forward? This was the question that seventeen storytellers from six different countries gathered at Emerson College to explore under the gentle guidance of Ashley [...]
Scottish Biodiversity Stories
An on-line project hosted by the Royal Botanical Gardens in Edinburgh and sponsored by Scottish Natural Heritage provides a searchable data base of audio and textual stories and information about Scottish species. The sources for these stories, and story-material, vary from interviews with elders, to scientific documents, to Scottish literature, to collections of traditional and [...]
Crumbfest in Edinburgh
I told the story of The True Meaning of Crumbfest last night at the Scottish Storytelling Centre‘s Christmas Storytelling Cafe. It is a profound story about how a young mouse by the name of Eckhart discovers what Christmas is all about. An environmental and animal-friendly take on the season by Prince Edward Islander David Weale. [...]
