The Story Works was officially – and brilliantly – launched by our patron, author Michael Rosen, in December. Michael spent a whole, wonderfully rewarding day with The Story Works team and volunteers, watching them deliver workshops to two different schools and chatting with the children and their teachers.
Michael talked about how delighted he was to become a patron of The Story Works, and how important it was to have a space in which children can explore their abilities to write, to “freewheel” and be creative without a fear of failure, or feeling under pressure to produce something that is grammatically perfect.
He also spoke of his concerns that children’s experience of reading and writing in schools is increasingly being linked to tests and exams, which results in them being encouraged to shape their writing to meet grammatical rules, rather than being allowed to explore things that they care about, that matter to them. “There is little time for for creativity, for exploration, for trial and error in the curriculum these days, which is a matter of great sadness to those of us who are interested in stories.”
What attracted him to The Story Works, he told the BBC reporters, was the way that we have created a space in which story, and children telling their stories, is at the heart of what we do. ‘Stories teach us empathy,’ he said. ‘They allow us to feel what it is like to be in another person’s shoes, and that is a very important thing.’
