Thanks Everyone for a Great Telling on March 1

Thanks Everyone for making a great success of our Giants and Wee Folk Storytelling on March 1st!
We had 40 kids and 30 adults who attended!

Lessons Learned? We would love to get any feedback from listeners or tellers….
* Keep program to 1 hour with 6 stories to 5-7 minutes and include action break, or song.
* Possible events to consider for this year: Earth Stories in April or Kick off Summer Reading in May? (Anyone Interested? Let us hear from you!)
We met afterwards and here is a summary of the discussion that followed:

1. Spellbinder On Going Activities

• Celebrations or Concerns

Wow! we have been busy with many extra tellings this year!
       A shout out goes to all how participated in the many events that include: Hayden, Ace, at both Strawberry Park and Soda Creek, Rotary, Senior Center, and the library
A round of Applause to David Moulton for organizing the ACE activities at Soda Creek

• Testing Schedule
  State Testing will begin at the Elementary schools so be aware of possible schedule changes.
  

2. News from the National Organization

• Chapter Dues
  I posted a powerpoint presentation from Catherine Johnson on the possibility of Spellbinder dues. If you haven’t seen it I encourage you to give it a look.
  There was a discussion among us as to whether we believe dues are in our future for our chapter. No decision was made, but we hope to discuss it at the end of the year meeting after everyone has a chance to think about it. I have a few questions to pose to Catherine about how dues might benefit our chapter as I would hope that any dues we collect might mean expanding opportunities to bring storytellers to our area or storytelling workshops for our volunteers. We would love to hear from all of you as to your thoughts about chapter dues both pro and con.

3. What’s new on our Spellbinder Webpage

• Links, new resources available at the library
  At the meeting we took another look at what our webpage offers in building your programs each month. Highlighted was the August house site that not only has a wealth of stories but features storytellers and activities. Sign up for the August House newletter and it will send you updates. Check out other ways to enhance your telling with string stories, draw and tell stories, or cut and tell stories that are short and fun between your stories. And if you are looking for new ideas, visit the library for some of the new resources: Tales with tails: storytelling the wonders of the natural world J 398.2 STR or Drawing stories from around the world: and a sampling of European handkerchief stories J 398.2 PEL or any of the books by Diane De Las Casas. If you are looking for ideas to use to help the kids make up a story with you check out: Show me a story: 40 craft projects and activities to spark children’s storytelling 745.5083 NEU (Adult Nonfiction)
  

4. End of the year

• Teacher Evaluations sent out in April
  FYI the teachers will be emailed an evaluation for their storyteller in April so they can give us feedback. I will share these with you at our end of the year meeting in June.
  
• Volunteer Logs due end of May
  Just a reminder that logs will be collected for our statistics at the end of May (Bring to June meeting or drop off at the library before) These are sent in to the National Organization in June.
  

5. Other
   Let us hear from you if you have any questions or concerns!