Mountain tales

Mountain tales

a day of storytelling and storymaking in the Cairngorms, 

Sunday April 14th 2013

last year, this little character entertained us

an environment full of starting points

 As part of a weekend of activities on the Wilderness Guide Training Programme, I will be leading a story day at Glenmore Lodge

My day will include chance to:

• experiment with ways of making up stories with groups,   
• using the world around us - the world your wilderness walk has taken you through - to shape new stories         
• draw instant poems from weather, landscape and moment       
• techniques for learning and telling traditional stories

Make the most of those round-the-fire evenings…..

This weekend also includes workshops on natural navigation, astronomy and Scottish geology and landforms by some very exciting workshop leaders. (Watching the rings of Saturn through a  telescope on a cold Cairngorm night was one of my highpoints of last year!)

Each workshop lasts a whole day and you can book in for one day or two - or if you are inspired, perhaps you will do the whole training programme

For booking details and prices contact: http://www.wild-scotland.org.uk/pages/contact-us/

the wider horizon, 2012

Strange recipes and secret places

ready for action

These have been eventful days of workshops all over the place

At St Thomas the Martyr Primary School in Upholland, we've beee looking at "our school" catching the secret life of the school its special places and the unexpected adventures of some of the animals that live around the school. These ideas resolved into pop-up cards and small, secret scenes in boxes...

Then at Coppull Primary School in a whirlwind day of storytelling and storymaking, I encountered a selection of superheroes including Football Boy (he tends to break things) and Skipping Girl (she skips up storms). There were tales of explorers in far flung corners of the globe finding shells, treasures and giant eggs. There were event some rather dubious Year 2's brewing terrible mixtures for our selection of "exciting pots that might be part of a story". I am not sure that we should invite you to sample them, but do try speaking them out loud wiht a certain sense of glee and enjoy the sound and rhythm of our recipes!

1. The King's Cup

to make the Queen happy

Chocolate, cheese and chicken,

Popcorn, pears and potatoes,

Sugar, champagne and shampoo.

Medals, mustard and mayonnaise.

Stir with a ladle for 16 days.

Put in front of the queen and

She'll think its wine.

Dark red like blood.

Green like bogeys

2. The Royal Gravy Pot

 a) Nasty gravy

Bogeys and biscuits,

Earwigs and eggs,

Pooh and pencils,

Ink and ice,

Spit, sparks and spiders,

Stir it up

Heat it gently,

Pour it quickly

Over their dinner

And watch them turn

Into boring books

b) Nice gravy

Pumpkin seeds and pears

Cherries and berries

Golden syrup and grapes

Honey and hot chocolate

Mix it well,

Boil for an hour

and pour it over a pancake

and finally....a beautiful secret scene from St Thomas'

Perfect Park Pizzas

a pizza of sliced flowers for butterflies

In the ongoing delightful craziness that is my work with Whitefield Infant School, the Reception classes had been working on senses and cookery. So when it came time to work with me and visit the lcoal park, we explored Victoria Park as chefs, designing pizzas for the animals (real, hoped for or monstrous) that live there

My brief is to encourage classes to use the local environment and to help inspire language....The poems are the children's own words and images. My job is to shuffle them into an order....I love the language

In the Park

Snow is slowly drifting down.

Falling in the water,

Melting,

Snow pirates sailing on the river

In the cold, cold, freezing cold

Magic flowers are growing,

There are suns made of snow

And stars

And rainbows of snow and ice,

In the cold, cold, freezing cold

Snow butterflies,
And snow trees,

Snow spiders and

Snow birds

In the cold, cold, freezing cold

Icicles grow everywhere

On fingers and noses

And ears and eyes

And faces and eyebrows and chins,

In the cold, cold, freezing cold

Ducks with cold toes are swimming

Racing us round the pond

Hoping for bread

But our pockets are empty,

In the cold, cold, freezing cold

But polar bears are waiting to roar

And penguins are sitting in the penguin houses,

Dinosaurs have snowball fights

And the troll sits in the tunnel waiting for spring

In the cold, cold, freezing cold

And then we got onto the pizzas themselves

a pizza in the park, divided into sections for sharing!

would you like to choose a pizza?

VICTORIA PARK PIZZA

Our pizza smells, of strong green leaves,

muddy brown leaves, red cherries

and blue jellies

Our pizza

Sounds like the wind in the trees, shouting children,

Feet trip trapping through the

Castle tunnel where the monster lives

Our pizza

Has tomato and cheese, mud and mushrooms.

Cheese and chicken and chips, pine cones and pepsi,

Cups and kites, leaves and lentils,

Ducks, pineapples and glass

Our pizza party has

Ladybirds and lions, elephants and owls,

Squirrels, dogs and gingerbread men

Our pizza will

Taste beautiful and wonderful and we

Will need a map to get past the troll

a pizza with fried egg, and handy glue-spreader to help in the eating of it!