Sandwell Council and BookTrust: training for early years storytelling professionals
Sandwell Council has introduced storytelling training for local early years practitioners, to support the delivery of BookTrust’s programmes and help get families sharing stories together.
Storyteller John Kirk at Sandwell Council’s Gifting With a Message training
At a children’s centre in West Bromwich, a classroom is set up and ready to welcome nursery professionals for the council’s “Gifting with a Message” training.
Staff from 90 early years settings from the 10% most deprived areas of Sandwell – who participate in BookTrust Toddler and Pre-Schooler – are here to explore how they can best use BookTrust resources to engage families with reading.
These sessions are a collaboration between Sandwell Libraries and Sandwell Quality Early Years Teams, who work with local nurseries and childminders to promote the importance of shared reading and to share BookTrust messaging.
“BookTrust helps us get books right into children’s homes,” says Laura Lohan, early years advisory teacher for Sandwell Council’s Quality Early Years and Childcare Team. “One nursery we invited today did some home visits with 18 of their families. Only two of them had books at home.
“In Sandwell, we have this slogan: ‘one council, one team.’ And I feel BookTrust has really come into that team.”
Laura Lohan, early years advisory teacher, Sandwell Council’s Quality Early Years and Childcare Team
The training also supports staff’s professional development and their confidence in engaging parents and carers with the benefits of sharing books as a family.
Laura says: “BookTrust’s research, along with its tips on gifting its resources to families is so timely for us. That’s the support practitioners really need.”
She adds: “One of our major objectives is that no BookTrust Toddler or Preschooler pack is just given to a child and put straight in a bag. Instead, we want 100% of the settings that attend this training to plan and deliver a ‘gifting with a message’ event for their children and families.”
Nicola Morris, children’s library team coordinator, Sandwell Libraries speaking with a training participant
A joined-up approach to supporting families’ reading journeys
Laura designed the training to be interactive and linked back to the Early Years Framework. Today, she’s here to deliver part of the session.
The group discusses everything from how blowing bubbles can help build children’s muscles used for speech, to overcoming the challenges of planning nursery storytelling events.
Storyteller John Kirk delivers an energetic part of the training, demonstrating techniques for delivering nursery story times, using BookTrust resources and other props. He inspires attendees to reflect on how books shared at nursery can spark families’ conversations at home, supporting children’s speech and language development.
Each practitioner also collects boxes of BookTrust Toddler and Preschooler resources and takes them away, ready to use them with families.
Laura says: “These training sessions provide practitioners with that time away from their nursery to sit and focus on shared reading and its impact on families.
“They also help us make sure we’re delivering consistent messages through the multiple touchpoints that children and families have – libraries, nurseries, family hubs and health visitors.
Sandwell Libraries’ Sandy Bear mascot
“We also link to Sandwell’s library service – we highlight its Sandy Bear mascot, for example, and we offer support to either get the library service to come and visit the settings, or for their families to visit the library.”
Nicola Morris, children’s library team coordinator for Sandwell Libraries, is here to meet with the practitioners to arrange the above – and she even puts on the Sandy Bear costume to demonstrate Sandwell Libraries’ fun, approachable efforts to make families feel welcome and engaged with their local library.
Early Years storytellers: feeling inspired to try new ideas
BookTrust resources incorporated into Sandwell Council’s Gifting With a Message training
After attending the training, nursery teacher Elise shares how she will be using the BookTrust programmes at her setting from now on. “Going ahead, I think it’s important that we plan an event to launch [the packs] so children and families are using them effectively and getting the most out of them,” she says. “It’ll be nice to invite our families in and model that storytelling experience.”
Nicola Morris adds: “I have witnessed so many practitioners here today who are excited to share that reading message. It’s so exciting that they will be taking that back and finding magical ways to inspire parents.”