In February, we were lucky to coordinate two storytelling workshops with the lovely people at the Village Storytelling Centre. 

The workshops were part of a wider project called Community Solutions that is working towards increasing the learning and options around community solutions to social care in Scotland. Staff and volunteers from organisations across Scotland came together to share their experiences of how COVID 19 had impacted their work and to learn how storytelling could help them work through this.

Throughout the sessions people shared their experiences of having to adapt to COVID- whether it was delivering food parcels, arranging befriending services over the phone, or setting up a community library in a phone box!

The storytelling techniques Lauren from Village Storytelling shared were a really useful way to begin sharing your own story, as well as considering how to share other people’s stories in an ethical, thoughtful way.

Fiona, who attended the sessions told us:

I loved the workshops. I would never normally join in these kind of things but Lauren made me feel at ease, the actual methods were easier than I expected and I had fun. Learning different ways to communicate is great and very much appreciated that they were freely available to participate in.

To find out more about the storytelling workshops or to arrange one for your own organisation, please email louise@otbds.org.

The project is a partnership between Healthcare Improvement Scotland, Nesta and Outside the Box.