StoryCorps

A developing entry...

Discovered a couple of days ago, this is a longer-term US oral history project.

StoryCorps (SC) is a general site - one thing Val and I have been discussing is whether 100V is too specific but then we don't have the infrastructure to support a vehicle like SC - this is an ongoing debate.

SC have a 'National Day of Listening' which falls immediately after Thanksgiving and 'black Friday' (lots of shopping on this annual public holiday)

One thing that is interesting, mentioned on the radio, is that there's some ideas that americans are more likely to have a say in public than we, somewhat more reserved, UK citizens? I don't necessarily agree with such generalisations but they might have a point?

News

Just a little update: Val and I are progressing this area now. Some events and thoughts are:

We presented a paper at the UoD's LTA Conference on 9th July 2009. This included our card which is now printed and some further thoughts behind the reason why we're doing what we're doing.

We also talked about (briefly) the advantages and disadvantages of blogs and wikis. Blogs are 'upsidedown' in that the latest items are at the top when you read them and they're linear. Perhaps more challenging is that contributions can only be freely made by using the Comments facility attached to each entry; this can be restricting as the only way to add an entry is to go through the address and this can be affected (wrongly so, I think) by perceptions about moderation and netiquette. The big advantage to blogs are that they are simple to access and use and we believe this outweighs some of the downsides.

Val has also collected some voices which we need to explore ways of putting this on the blog; these are audio files of practitioners talking about their experiences. Whilst Val and I were discussing this, we started to address the important issue of editing - more on both these and others, we suspect, later!

Story or Comment?

To Post a Story or Comment

To Post a Story

Simply, write your story in Word and send it to a.sanders@derby.ac.uk. Remember to think of a catchy heading and to put a name and date at the bottom. If everything’s OK, then it’ll be put on 100V. Remember, Netiquette!

To Post a Comment

Go to 100V Blog. Click on the ‘comments’ at the foot of the Story you want to make a comment on. Follow the instructions in the box that pops up, and send. If all is OK, it’ll appear.

If you want to comment on a comment, then just click on the comment, comment (if you see what we mean!). If you want to see your Comment, then go to the 100V Blog, click on the Story Title and it’ll appear (with others).

Andrew
8th March 2009

Story#2

Abigail’s Beads

I sometimes joke about strategies to work with children and one of these is to lock an errant child in a dark cupboard. I was talking with a Childminder recently and she was able to share a story.

Abigail was making a necklace and bangle with those luminous beads you can get and was naturally enthusiastic about see how they worked. The childminder’s only option was to put her in the cupboard under the stairs in her hall so she could see the effects. This little dark room was still occupied when mum turned up at the front door...

Andrew

8th March 2009

Story#1

Potential Boredom and a Surprise

One of the aspects of being a childcare worker is the potential boredom of the job and there’s one thing that really gets me, that’s when there’s not enough children around. Staffing ratios mean that you have to be staffed up for the eventuality but sometimes this is far from the inevitable – you may have a predicted, say, 12 children planned for and then only two turn up for the three staff you have there.

This is when you have to think creatively. You can, of course, go out – you often have the ‘ratio’ to do this and it’s a change, isn’t it? It’s a very good idea to have a ready-made permission slip available so when the children arrive you can talk to the parents and obtain specific (even though you probably have a blanket low-level one attached to the registration forms) permission. To have this, you have to have some ideas about what this ‘specific’ might be. We used to go on the tram, to the local shops and supermarket, to a park, for instance; keeping this to a simple activity is a wise move and extreme sports, whilst a useful experience, are not generally advised.

Thinking about going out and the public arena, some 15 or so years ago I used to work with children with downs syndrome and I had a weird (or so it seemed at the time) experience with an 11 year old boy with whom I was working in the Derbyshire Peak District. Having just driven to a small town there, we were walking along together and a passer-by pressed a £1 coin into my hand. When I asked what it was for, the reply was that is was “ for your son, get him something special”. I can’t recall my immediate response but I do remember being surprised.

Later I got to thinking that, as a parent in this situation, this might be quite common? I also thought that there’s a certain finality about the condition, nothing will change significantly and the carer’s situation is one for life…one which contains a lot of devoted parental love.

4th March 2009
Andrew