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(This Is Why I Teach EC) Story Baskets – with Michelle Anderson

    If you’re struggling to get your preschoolers engaged during storytime, and if you want to deepen their learning on any topic… join us as we teach you how to create a story basket so you can truly bring stories to life.

    My guest is Michelle Anderson, a creator of This Is Why I Teach EC and the Storybasketeers

    Membership community. Michelle has over 25 years of experience in the early childhood education space. Her idea to create story baskets helped teachers across the globe to get their kiddos interested in learning and reading. 

    If you want to find out what story baskets are and how to bring them into your classroom, tune in right now!

    Who Is Michelle and How She Created Story Baskets

    For Michelle, everything started with a Facebook page. There were many great pages for teachers out there, but not many for New Zealanders. She wanted to create something that would inspire and celebrate teaching and New Zealand. 

    Soon, the page grew beyond New Zealand to include teachers across the UK and the United States as well. Michelle listened to what teachers and parents wanted and the majority needed tips and tricks to make reading time more engaging. 

    That’s how the idea for story baskets was born. Michelle created her first basket back in the ‘90s. She almost forgot about the idea as she was dedicated to teaching, but she always kept them in the back of her mind. She went back to creating the baskets because she recognized they were play-based, they enriched learning, and they could cover any curriculum topic and expand on what the children were really interested in. 

    Michelle shared the baskets on her page and teachers were immediately interested. Because she knew their value, she offered to help teachers create the baskets. She created her first seven-day challenge and things just took off from there. 

    The next step was a membership club, Storybasketeers. One of the group members came up with the name, and in Michelle’s words, the whole club is shared in creation and learning. Together, they create new baskets every month and constantly evolve. 

    This Is What Story Baskets Are and How to Use Them

    In its essence, a story basket contains a basket, some cloth, a book, and anything else around your preschool or home that helps kids engage with the story. If you’re great at arts and crafts, you can also make different things to include in the baskets. 

    The best part about story baskets is that there are no limits to what you can include, as long as it helps get kids interested in the story. Cloth is something that brings texture and invites kids to play. It can represent grass, or the sky, or waves. Items included in the basket should be used to create a setting, a magical world kids want to dive into. The baskets are also transportable, so you can use them in the playroom or in the garden. 

    In terms of using the baskets, Michelle found that there are two great ways to introduce them to kids. One way is for kids to freely engage with baskets and play. That’s a great way for you as a teacher to observe and learn what kids connect with and what they might ask for as a way to expand the story.

    The other is for teachers or parents to become storytellers and use baskets to guide the story. Depending on the ages, you can let kids play with items while you read or model how the items should be used. 

    Learn How to Incorporate Any Topic Into Your Basket

    Story baskets can be used for both fiction and nonfiction books – in fact, Michelle is just now developing instructions for nonfiction story baskets. She believes that any topic can be covered through a basket. She likes using them as a way to tell a life cycle story of plants or animals, for example. Kids engage with that really well and they use the items to retell or recreate the story. 

    Story baskets are a way to get children interested in learning and books through play. It’s all about noticing and following their interests and being open to adding items that work for them. Michelle’s made over 250 baskets, and not all of them have worked. That’s why the whole process is about a shared experience of learning and creating, both for kids and teachers. The end goal is to get a feeling that you and the kids have become a part of the story.

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