National Storytelling Week

National Storytelling Week - 27th January to 4th February

As National Storytelling Week started during the weekend of the Big Garden Bird Watch, I didn't start any activities until Monday. I kept it simple with lots of their favourite books and some story baskets. 

The obvious ones were a couple of Julia Donaldson books as I have props. We have wooden story spoons with the characters from The Gruffalo on, as well as a couple of soft toys, plus we have the soft toys from Stick Man, so they were the first ones out.

The Cub loves the wooden spoons so when we started telling stories with them he was in his element. They both loved listening to the story and getting to act it out.

Another favourite is We're Going on a Bear Hunt, so I dug out a bear and our family characters and found some props to use for their journey. We had some felt for the swishy swashy grass, a play silk for the river, some tissue paper for the mud, some packing peanuts for the snowstorm, and some plastic trees for the forest.

Bear absolutely loved this, and it makes me want to do more of these, especially with some messy play. I need to do more messy/sensory play with the boys, but bizarrely it isn't the mess that stops me, it's the thinking ahead and setting up part that usually means they never see the light of day, despite how many I have saved as amazing ideas!

One of Bear's favourite movies is Toy Story, and whilst setting up some of the obvious favourite books, I came across the book for this and added it last minute with all of his toys. Watching them both with this one was lovely to see, Bear is a huge Buzz Lightyear fan, they both love Mr Potato Head and The Cub likes Forky, so watching them play alongside each other made a nice change from their usual huffing at each other for being in each other's space.

To round off National Storytelling Week, I bought Bear some Story Cubes from Waterstones which are dice with images on to prompt story ideas. I have always loved the idea of these and when thinking of ways to assist Bear's storytelling, as it is something he loves, and does regularly, it made perfect sense. I picked them up while at work and he has absolutely loved them. 

His stories are still very basic, but he is still only little. His imagination and creativity astound me daily, so I can't wait to see what these encourage. 

And I will leave you with the first story out of the tin today which was adorable... "A buzzy bee crossed a bridge and then a star would break the bridge and then a lock would toddle up to the bridge and like "Oh no!" And that was the story." I'll let you guess what images were on the dice :)

Momma Bear x