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| Main Stage Audience at Telling Tales Festival 2016 - Photo by M.L.Holton |
I had the good fortune of attending my first Telling Tales Festival (now in it's 8th year) at Westfield Heritage Village this past Sunday. What a joy-filled & brilliant event this is!
The Festival convincingly engages & entertains on multiple levels, all geared towards developing and encouraging interest in literacy for youngsters. The focus is 'story-telling' at its very finest.
A 'Good Book' gives so much, much more then just 'a story'. Converting a child to read in this current age of 'screen dominance' is, seemingly, an up-hill battle. But, as the author, Dr.Daniel Coleman, rightly explains in this video, literacy can OPEN a child's IMAGINATION in ways unimaginable by just vision-based content. It creates complex synaptic associations that build the ground-work for future constructive & creative thinking. It envelops the MIND in worlds outside of one's own experience or knowledge. All told, a Good Book nurtures a profound love of the essential 'code' of language - WORDS.
What follows are my own impressions from my first visit to this heart-warming Festival. It's like nothing I've ever seen or heard before. I truly wish 'Telling Tales' would SPREAD nation-wide like wildfire ...
Much credit must go to the Festival founder, Susan Jasper: a woman with a clear & well-developed innate literate VISION ... KUDOS to the WHOLE 'Telling Tales' team!!
And, next year, For Sure, GO with your Children!
Impressions of Telling Tales Festival 2016 from canadada on Vimeo.