Tell Your Story

To celebrate European Year of Intercultural Dialogue 2008, the Chester Beatty Library and Draíocht, collaborated in a unique project involving primary school children from multi-ethnic backgrounds living in the Dublin 15 area. With Blanchardstown being the fastest growing area in the country, with the youngest population (over 40% of the population of Fingal is under 15 years of age), and representing 100 nationalities (21% of its population), it was the perfect location for an intercultural project of this kind.

The goal of ‘Tell Your Story’, devised by Draíocht and Chester Beatty Library, was to provide positive arts experiences around storytelling in order to build language skills, confidence, arts awareness and multicultural understanding through highlighting commonality and celebrating difference.

The project began on the 31st of March with a field trip to the Chester Beatty Library, located in the grounds of Dublin Castle and a tour of the library’s collection. Members of Chester Beatty Library Education Department’s freelance team guided the children through the visual feast that is the collection of artistic treasures from some of the great cultures and religions of the world, including treasures from Asia, the Middle East, North Africa and Europe. Full of inspiration, the children returned to their classrooms to start a series of over 50 workshops in storytelling, poetry and visual arts taking place over six weeks with the project’s skilled artists and practitioners from both organizations.

Twenty nationalities were represented by the 148 children (including Albanian, Filipino, Irish, Kazakhstani, Latvian, Nigerian, Saudi Arabian and Zimbabwean children), who are aged between 6 and 12 years, and this project encouraged each child to tell their own individual story. By listening to their class friends, the children enjoyed and explored each other’s cultural heritage, encouraging them to share, create and celebrate the stories that are important to them. These sessions led to exciting new discoveries and friendships as the children got to know more about each other and the many cultures they represent.

After six weeks of classroom workshops, the project finished in Draíocht on 10 May 2008, with a Family Day and Exhibition of some of the children’s handmade work including clay face masks, treasure chests and hand-stained and decorated journey scrolls. The families of all 148 children were invited to Draíocht where the project was officially closed by Bob Kelly, of RTE’s ‘No Place like Home’.

The entire project was recorded by filmmakers Neil Dowling and Paddy Shirley, and each child received a copy of the finished DVD to add to their treasure chest when the project finished.

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Additional Project Information:

The 20 nationalities of the children represented in the project were (in alphabetical order): Albanian, Filipino, Indian, Iranian, Irish, Italian, Kazakhstani, Latvian, Lithuanian, Moldovan, Nigerian, Pakistani, Polish, Portugese, Romanian, Saudi Arabian, Slovakian, South African, Sudanese, Zimbabwean.

Working in tandem in the six schools over 6 weeks were arts practitioners:
Niall de Burca (Storytelling) / John ‘The Explorer’ Mahon (visual arts) / Julie Duane (Storytelling) / Sarah Kernaghan (Visual Arts) / Jenni Cleary (Visual Arts) / Triona Langan (Visual Arts) / Philip Kennedy (Visual Arts) / Thomas O’Connor (Visual Arts) / Seamus Cashman (Poetry & Storytelling) / Neil Dowling (Film Maker) / Paddy Shirley (Film Maker)

The six primary schools that took part were:

1. Mary Mother of Hope (Littlepace) (3rd Class aged 8-9 years)
2. Tyrellstown Educate Together (Tyrellstown) (1st Class, aged 6-7 years)
3. Scoil Bhride Cailini (Blanchardstown) (4th Class, aged 9-10 years)
4. Castleknock Educate Together (Blanchardstown) (6th Class, aged 11-12 years)
5. St Philip the Apostle, Junior School (Mountview) (1st Class, aged 6-7 years)
6. Scoil Mhuire Senior School (Blanchardstown) (5th Class 10-11 years)