All our training is currently delivered online. Upcoming courses are advertised here and on the Surviving through Story Facebook page www.facebook.com/survivingthroughstory/
Taster workshops for 2021 feature ways in which Storysharing® can be used in different ways and combined with other interventions.
Storysharing and Story Massage 21st January 2021
Personal experience stories are vital for all young people to build memories and form relationships. The Story Massage Programme are both designed to enable young people with severe and profound disabilities, who communicate at a sensory level, to enjoy and share stories. They are also applicable across the range of SENDs. We will explore how teachers and parents can use the techniques to personalise a story, and the role of touch and movement in establishing memory. Tutors are Mary Atkinson (Story Massage Programme), Katrina Arab & Nicola Grove (Storysharing®) and Gill White, Family Parent Consultant, PAMIS. Participants will receive a certificate of attendance. For more about The Story Massage Programme go to https://www.storymassage.co.uk, and the work of PAMIS on multisensory storytelling http://pamis.org.uk
Finding a voice through stories in sign 18th February 2021
This event will explore the creative ways that young people with learning disabilities can use gestures and Key Word Sign (eg.Makaton, Signalong and Làmh). Teachers and speech therapists often focus on vocabulary learning, but careful observation shows that they are capable of so much more than this. We will demonstrate how they tell stories in conversation, holding the floor and asserting themselves, and actively engaging in discussion. Supporting these skills means abandoning our preconceptions about their capabilities and being open to learning from and with them as co-producers of dialogue. Led by SLT Charlotte Parkhouse and teacher Gareth Smith (Communicapers https://www.communicapers.co.uk) and Nicola Grove. We are drawing on original research first presented in the groundbreaking 2019 publication Manual Sign Acquisition in Children with Developmental Disabilities, now available in paperback and individual chapter purchase https://novapublishers.com/shop/manual-sign-acquisition-in-children-with-developmental-disabilities/
Sharing personal stories through AAC 18th March 2021.
It can be difficult for young people using communication aids and books to be really spontaneous. Speech and Language Therapist and Storysharing® Practitioner Ashleigh Paddon https://the-therapy-tree.com and parent Jitka Jakubcova have been working together to create engaging open ended personal experience narratives, and will share how they do it
STORYSHARING® TRAINING
- Foundations of Storysharing – webinar to describe and discuss the approach. Next training 29th April 2021
- Practitioner training: Webinars, self study and certification through reflective practice and personal tutorials. This is an accreditation which confirms that you have developed your skills to a recognised level, and are qualified to use the approach in a range of settings with different special needs and disabilities. It gives you access to the Members site, with videos, modules, resources, online support and reading to support the development of your practice
“Having seen the videos in the annual review I know it does work- pupils are expressing themselves very coherently and you wouldn’t necessarily expect them to do it.They’ve got structure, it makes sense and they are engaged with their story- and it is their story. Its personal- it’s about them, rather than having to fit into someone else’s structure.”
Contact us if you are interested in…
- Family workshops
- Mentor training in Storysharing® for people with learning disabilities who want to advocate for colleagues and friends who have severe communication difficulties.
- Training for whole schools or organisations
“It fits into everything and that is what I like about it- it’s simple, it’s portable, and it’s adaptive, whatever you need it to be it can be that and that’s why it works!”