Training Sessions

We highly recommend watching these videos together as a team to ensure consistent implementation of the training and, more importantly, because it’s fun! Timed activities within the videos are designed to get you and your colleagues thinking creatively and get you excited to start telling stories with the children.

If you're a childminder or independent practitioner working alone, why not buddy up with someone so you can train together? Get in touch with us, and we'll see what we can do.

We recommend spacing out each of the 5 core training videos over a few months/terms to allow time for embedding.

Session 1: This session covers the fundamentals, focussing on quality interactions and the background behind why language and communication is so important. This is a really useful session for newcomers to a team.
When? Start anytime! Choose when works best for you and your team.

Session 2: Group stories is the focus here and gets you moving with the TTK symbols. If you have an experienced team, you may find you can combine Sessions 1 and 2 into a single training workshop. Once your group stories are full of excitement you can move on to...
‍When? Soon after Session 1 - a week after or even on the same day.

Session 3 - After a month or so, you'll all be confident in using the symbols and the Big Bags. Hooray! Now that you're group stories are an inventive playground of story, you can progress into more storytelling techniques and get using the rest of the TTK resources.
When? Wait a month after Session 2 to embed practice.
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Session 4 - By now, you and the children should be storytelling whizzes and all those engaging methods for story should have everyone excited to make and record stories. So those young authors need the muscles to get writing their incredible stories down on paper! We know it's hard to do, but don't jump to get them writing too soon! Remember that progressing to writing is always a big step for children. They'll pick it up much better once their oral storytelling skills are feeling strong and robust, so use all the tools in your arsenal from Sessions 1-3 for as long as you think it's needed before moving to Session 4.
When? Wait at least a month after Session 3 to embed practice.‍
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Session 5 - Time to take stock and celebrate the achievements of your team and the children.
When? End of term or end of year.

In the final training session, we’ll discuss methods for evaluation. You will also receive an A3 record book as part of your resource pack. Scribe stories from the children, stick in their drawings and add images and photographs from your story sessions. You can then look back on the progress the children have made.

Our members area contains lots of Resources to help extend your use of Tales Toolkit, as well as Webinars that are ideal for CPD.We’re always keen to improve our offering of resources, if you have a request.