In May, 1994 and again in July, 1994, I had the priviledge of attending Mary-Elin Renzullo's workshops
on Story Aprons held at RESCUE (renamed Education Connection) in Litchfield. Both of these workshops were excellent
- probably the best I have attended. Not only did the participants learn the technique of storytelling with the story aprons,
but we were treated to numerous entertaining examples of stories! We spent two full days organizing a series of stories and
worked to create the story apron pieces for each one. Mary-Elin provided the laminating machine and we were able to go back
to our classes with enough materials to do several stories while our enthusiasm for the technique was still high!
While Mary-Elin's workshop was designed primarily for librarians, as a Language, Speech and Hearing
Clinician, I found that the techniques she discussed could easily be implemented with children who needed vocabulary and concept
development, improvement of verbal expression, memory and sequencing, and practice with correct articulation. I have begun
using story aprons with the preschool and kindergarten children on my caseload and they are excited and eager to participate
when I plan to "Cook up a Story!"
I highly endorse Mary-Elin and her Story Apron Workshops!
Adele Banas, MA, CCC-SLP
Speech / Language Pathologist
Shared
Services (retired)
