TinyTales is a performing arts initiative invested in taking stories to children through the medium of theatre.

The TinyTales team consists of three theatre graduates and storytellers: Kalpesh, Pratiksha & Santosh whose journey began when QUEST (Quality Education Support Trust) announced a Goshtrang fellowship to work with children in Ashramshala, Sonale village (District Palghar).

“We applied for the fellowship and through it we were able to perform stories for children in several schools,” shared Kalpesh. “Interactions with the children made us realise how the sessions affected them, and we decided that the experience  shouldn’t be restricted to children in one region. We felt the need to reach out to more children in more schools in more villages.”

The outcome of this strong belief  was TinyTales.

“Today, because of their hectic schedules, children do not have the free time to go and watch plays. So we decided to take the plays to them. We do not need a professional stage with sounds and lights; we improvise to present our stories wherever possible. In classrooms, under trees or even on playgrounds. We only need some space and enthusiastic kids as an audience.”

After 90+ shows, TinyTales realised that while listening to and watching stories, children get emotionally involved with them. “They laugh with us, they cry with us. This joy of learning together is really immense.” said Kalpesh. “Adding a visual element to storytelling not only strengthens the audience’s imagination but also subtly demonstrates the spirit of  teamwork, which is the base of any theatre activity.” Though theatre is at its heart a form of entertainment, TinyTales attempts to present a different world to children through stories which can enrich and broaden their way of thinking.

The team discovered the StoryWeaver platform when looking for the book 'My Best Friend' by Anupa Lal and Suvidha Mistry.  "It's like a Pustakancha Khajana for us" shares Kalpesh "and now we have a perfect list of great book to use. We have used a number of books from workshop and got great results."

 Geetanjali Kulkarni (Goshtrang, Project Head), Nilesh Nimkar (Founder of Quest) and Prasad Wanarse (TinyTales, Director), have chosen stories based on the age of the audience. "We’ve included books from the StoryWeaver platform such as जपून रे सत्तू! and बुजगावण्यांची वरात. All these stories were directed by Prasad Wanarase and we performed these stories in Marathi.”

 

 

The group has also begun to add more components to their sessions like ‘Goshtincha War’ where they gather together with students and read out stories to them. “This way they are introduced to various authors and their books and hear and learn new words too.”

“Our objective is to work with the kids as per their needs and demands. Most important of all are the little viewers who are genuine and constructive in their feedback. That’s why we love to work with them.”

- Kalpesh, Pratiksha & Santosh

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Khyati Datt from our Partnerships Team, reports on how Pratham Education Foundation in Mumbai is using a community-centric approach to drive change in a neighbourhood.  

It’s a bright and early morning at  Pratham Mumbai’s Bharat Nagar Centre. The centre incharge and trainers are gearing up for a long day of visiting nearby communities and interacting with children. We asked them, “What book do you and the children enjoy reading the most?”. After some excited discussions amongst themselves, the trainers happily informed us, “the one with the turtle”. We're still trying to figure out which turtle books it is!

Pratham Education Foundation is one of the country’s  largest non-governmental organizations, working on high-quality, low-cost, replicable interventions to address gaps in the education system. Pratham’s Mumbai chapter started work in 1994 with the aim to create a societal mission for achieving universal pre-primary & primary education in the city. Since inception, Pratham Mumbai has impacted the lives and learning of many children.  In just the year 2017-18, the chapter has managed to reach more than 42,000 children.

Taking the community along. Always.  

One of the organization’s centres in Mumbai is a Community Resource Centre in Bharat Nagar. The centre focuses on providing education support to the children and parents of 15-20 communities in the vicinity and additionally, provide children with access to reading material in the form of a library.

Reena More, Rachna Gurav and Sheetal Jagdhani work in the Bharat Nagar centre and have been working with Pratham for more than 11 years now. They, along with a few other trainers, are responsible for ensuring that all the interventions for the 15-20 communities run smoothly.  The trainers plan each day in the community well in advance, so that all the interventions run in a structured manner, even if they are not there to supervise the children. They believe that it’s very important to meet all the stakeholders in the communities regularly and therefore, visit two communities every day to interact with the parents and the children. These visits help the trainers keep the student and parent engagement alive and active!

 

Source: Children at Pratham Mumbai’s Community Resource Centre in Bharat Nagar.

Making children independent readers

The programmes at the centre are targeted towards children of all ages. Children from Grades 3 to 8 interact with the trainers on a weekly basis for support classes and for access to books to read. The trainers have ensured that the children learn independently and if required, with the support of their peers.  Sheetal shares that focus on reading is a very important objective for the trainers at the centre because “by reading stories or hearing stories, children are exposed to a wide range of words and it helps them to build their vocabulary, comprehension, listening and communication skills.”

The trainers have downloaded stories from StoryWeaver in Hindi, English, Marathi & Urdu and have put them on their laptops as per levels. The children sit in a group, around a laptop and read together. Each group has a leader who takes responsibility for ensuring that all the children in his/her group read and even helps them comprehend the story. The children are encouraged to engage further with the books through assignments and  activities and are also asked to give their feedback and share their opinion about the book they have read. Reena shares that even if the children are unable to come to the centre, they meet at a friend’s house and try and read books together. The trainers shared that two stories the children love reading are Kaakaasaurus and Gul in Space because while one makes them laugh, the other one makes them wonder about the world.

Source:  Children reading in a group at the Bharat Nagar Centre

The trainers interact with the parents of children as young as 3 years old and support them through workshops, so that the parents take responsibility for the learning of their children. Rachna says, “we encourage the parents to borrow books from the library and read books to their children in the mother tongue language.”

They also train the anganwadi workers so that the young children are learning something each day. The trainers are aware of the busy schedule of the parents, which is why they encourage the anganwadi workers to give the children simple, short assignments that the parents can help with.

All the trainers at the Bharat Nagar centre have been engaging with the children and the stakeholders in the community for a long time. Their experience over all these years has shown them that by encouraging children and parents to read, children become more curious and the parents become more involved and engaged in their child’s learning.

We love the parent engagement that Pratham centres actively drive. Here is to many happy hours of reading together!

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This year, we published a book called 'How Do Aeroplanes Fly?' on StoryWeaver in 10 languages. The book – written by Aditi Sarawagi and illustrated by Lavanya Karthik - was recently introduced to a group of children in Kota, Rajasthan, by a colleague during one of her field visits. One of the interesting observations she had made was that the children – both boys and girls – were struck by the mention of female pilots. “We didn't know that women could fly planes,” one of them had said to her. You can watch a related video here.

 

While I'm aware of disparities existing in every corner of India, this still took me by surprise. It also made me realize that all the thinking we do, as publishers, teachers and parents – which often feels like overthinking – is most definitely a good thing. Including a woman pilot and an Indian one at that had made a difference here, after all. 

Over the last couple of years, there has been a lot of conversation around the growing need for diverse and inclusive books. And what does diversity mean, you ask. I suppose it could mean a range of things: from gender and religion, to language and ethnicity. The website We Need Diverse Books has listed down their vision as “A world in which all children can see themselves in the pages of a book." In India, initiatives like @genderlogindia and BAM! Books have actively helped keep this conversation alive.

In 2012, a national consultation involving experts from institutions, authors, editors, publishers, librarians and educators was organized by National Book Trust. 'The Good Books Guide', the document that emerged from this gathering, speaks about diversity and inclusion in its section on values. “There is a need to realize that many groups – and their world-view and perspectives – are often ignored in children's literature. For instance, girls, tribal or dalit children, children with special needs, working children and those living in urban slums, don't get enough representation in mainstream literature.”

When I think about the first set of books that were published on StoryWeaver (released digitally first), a few titles come to mind. To be completely honest though, it feels odd to be calling these books diverse. Why should a boy cooking be thought of as diverse? Why should a book featuring a single-parent household be slotted as diverse? Just because there are characters from the North-East of India, should a book be treated as diverse? Children living near a garbage dump... diverse? 

Here's the thing though. There aren't enough children's books, especially in India, in which boys or men are shown to be cooking. Single-parent households in children's books? Hardly. Characters from the North-East? A handful. Well, you get the point. In a world in which children are surrounded with fear, prejudice and suspicion, these stories – which include multiple perspectives and help build empathy - become all the more important. Stories with diverse characters will help them realize that 'the other' – in any regard – is more like them than they had imagined. And that even if they weren't, these differences are to be celebrated.

If we want our children to be independent in their thinking, we certainly need to give them access to rich and eclectic narratives that not only only inspire curiosity, but also show rigid patterns being broken gracefully. In Ross Montgomery's recent article on 'Why Writing Diverse Children's Books is Tough', he addresses a lot of issues that well-meaning authors are likely to run into. After all, you don't want to include diverse characters in your book just for the sake of having diversity, do you? But as he points out, “We all have to strive to create well-rounded diverse characters and find new ways of writing. The fact that it’s hard isn’t a good enough excuse: we have to step away from the established paths and take more risks. Who knows - we might even find a better one.” 

 

And while you're (hopefully) contemplating these rather baffling questions, allow us to make suggestions of a few books that we consider diverse. Please add your book recommendations in the comments section below.

Favourites from StoryWeaver & Pratham Books

Please note that all these books are available in multiple languages.

1. Bonda and Devi
In this story of unlikely friendship, Devi – one of the protagonists – is physically challenged. Set in the future, we had to make the wheelchair kind of futuristic as well. Spot it?

2. Where Did Your Dimples Go?
Langlen's father is Tamil and mother is Manipuri. It was just before this story was illustrated that one of the contributors suggested that Langlen's (formerly known as Leela) mother be from the North-East region of India, since it is hugely under-represented in children's books. 

3. Dum Dum-a-Dum Biryani
Bored of seeing only women cooking in children's books? Finally, a boy who loves to cook! Meet Basha, who loves to hang around in the kitchen as his Ammi cooks all kinds of delicious dishes.

4. A Helping Hand
Told through a series of letters, this is a moving story of acceptance and blossoming friendship. 

5. Chuskit Goes to School  

Set in Ladakh, this is the story of Chuskit, a differently-abled girl who longed to go to school but was unable to because she could not walk. But after a nine-year wait, she is finally able to go to school!

6. Freedom Run
In many tiny villages in Uttar Pradesh, small children work long hours at the looms to create carpets famous around the world for their intricate designs. This is a story about the forgotten children of India.
7. Didi Ka Rang Biranga Khazaana
Living close to a garbage dump, these children run around garbage all day, without attending school. But then one day, Didi walks into the dump, changing their lives forever. Meet Didi and her young friends in this wonderful story that celebrates the joy of reading.
8. Adikhani series (a set of 10 bilingual books)
Drawing inspiration from the challenges facing tribal education, three organisations (Pratham Books, Ignus-ERG with the support of Bernard van Leer Foundation) held writing workshops with authors speaking Saura, Munda, Kui and Juanga languages to create picture books for early readers. These charming stories are drawn from the rich oral tradition of various tribal languages and the illustrations use tribal art with a contemporary twist. The script used in these books is Odia.

9. Chipko Takes Root

Dichi, a brave Bhotiya girl, takes part in the Chipko movement to save her beloved trees.

10. Manikantan Has Enough
Manikantan isn't pleased about having moved from his beautiful village to Smart City where his every move is being watched. But he did it for Amma, who is his mother and father and all the family he had in the world.

Favourites From Other Publishers
1. 'Bhimrao Ambedkar: The Boy Who Asked Why' by Sowmya Rajendran and Satwik Gade (Tulika)
2. 'The Princess with the Longest Hair' by Komilla Raote and Vandana Bist (Katha)
3. 'The Lonely King and Queen' by Deepa Balsavar (Tulika)
4. 'The Sackclothman' by Jayasree Kalathil (DC Books)
5. 'Dear Mrs. Naidu' by Mathangi Subramanian (Young Zubaan)
6. 'Simply Nanju' by Zainab Sulaiman (Duckbill Books)

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