StorySolving is currently in the running in the Stories for GOOD Challenge for a chance to win $3000 to donate a FREE Tour of Teacher Training and Student Workshops at under-served and underfunded schools in the US. This program combines Storytelling + Process Drama + Tough Topics (such as Bullying) to generate Positive Problem Solving.
Bullying is Personal for me. I was bullied from the time I was 5 until I was 13. In 7th grade it got so bad that the Entire class would gang up on me and pull pranks on me. I went from being a straight A student to NOT wanting to go to school, to being sick, feeling hopeless & crying nearly every day; we didn’t call it depression then, but that was most likely what I was experiencing.
Something had to change. For me it was Theatre. At age 13, I discovered the power of performance to address difficult issues. I learned that through theatre I could access my own feelings about being bullied and I could get others to listen to me through the magic of drama. I could be Anyone. I could share my pain and I could make people Laugh.
Fast Forward to many years later… As a Storyteller much of my work is in sharing Compassion, connecting people and cultures together while Teaching Tolerance and Acceptance.
As an adult I developed StorySolving in order to address tough topics; those issues that are often hard to simply speak about, but somehow are more easily digested through the power of story. And now I want to Share StorySolving with the world. I know it works! StorySolving was piloted and perfected in Belize as part of my volunteer project Literacy Outreach Belize. It has worked in dozens of schools in Belize, both inner city and in far flung villages. It has worked at teacher trainings in Belize, Thorpe (25 min south of London) and at Malardalen University and Vasterburg Folk School in Sweden.
How does it work?
Teachers and/or Students listen to a story with an unsatisfying ending. We discuss the messages the story conveys relating it to not only classroom settings, but the world outside. Participants are then asked to work in small groups where they discuss the current ending of the story; its broader implications as told. Next they brainstorm to re-tell or re-write a more positive solution and story ending. Finally, they share their new ending with the group, usually performing for the rest of the participants and we discuss if and how the new ending helps solve the problem in a more satisfying way.
Always we speak about the need for compassion for both sides. StorySolving has been very effective in addressing Bullying and in helping both students and teachers to have more compassion not only for those bullied but for the bullies themselves. Bullying is only one topic, StorySolving can be used to address a myriad of issues.
StorySolving has been invited to expand into Accra Ghana and Nairobi Kenya as well as TamilNadu area of India.
With your help, StorySolving can also conduct a FREE tour to under-served and underfunded schools right here in the US. Please click on the link below to learn more about the Stories for GOOD Challenge and to vote for StorySolving. Thank you! And HUG!
You can vote by clicking here: StorySolving