Simon Koolwijk

On the 29th August, 2014 the Ethiopian Social Accountability Program Phase 2 (ESAP2) organized the Participatory Video Oscar Reward ceremony in Addis Ababa. Fifteen organisations had submitted each 5 videos for participatory video interventions, they had conducted between March and July, 2014. Five organizations, who were nominated, had to compete prior to the PV Oscar Reward ceremony. Finally the winner was selected and rewarded in the Washington Hotel, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In this video some of the participatory video facilitators and a community member comment on how PV impacted and influenced their work. The PV Oscar competition brought some surprising result for them.Watch:

Good stories sustain. From scientific research it has been proven, that people remember powerful stories best. Especially if stories are true-ish and told with emotion, people do not tend to forget them. In the course ‘Facilitating Storytelling’ held on the 15 th April, 2014 participants got acquainted with some major principles on how to tell and share powerful stories. Powerful stories are used for: Branding/ marketing; Organizational change; Knowledge transfer; Lobby, campaigning and awareness raising; Games   An example of a powerful story, you can watch at Specsavers Emergency Drone Delivery: Through the application of some useful tools, such as the symbol, the river, the Little Red Ridinghood and the Bad Wolf practice was gained on how to develop a powerful story. By the end a stripcartoon was designed visualizing a story abou t the added value of education.   Read strip cartoon about Education . The next training on ‘Facilitating St...

Last week I facilitated a workshop with the aim to harvest funny fictional stories. I applied the facilitation method of the ‘Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf’ .   After sharing the story of Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf , I explained the main characteristics of a good story. Definition of a story : A story is a representation of events that are associated with each other. A story has the following characteristics: ·          Is self-explanatory and has a beginning, middle and end; ·          Contains narrative elements; ·          Is authentic: true or true-ish; ·          Is personal; ·          Calls on emotions and / or is told with emotion. Narrative elements are: 1.        A main character (protagonis...

Collecting personal stories can provide some interesting insights on what is going on in a project or a community.   In june 2013, I worked for two weeks with O2Zone.tv .   This organization, based in Salon de Provence – France, aims to strengthen organisations and structures of social work in applying participatory video for building social cohesion amongst people or communities. O2Zone.tv trains social workers, teachers, trainers who work with groups or communities. Their work is mainly based in France, but also participates in projects in Africa and Canada. Video productions are disseminated through their webtv channel at http://www.o2zone.tv/ Storytelling   by local entrepreneurs Marseille – Provence has been designated in 2013 as cultural capital of Europe. Under the name MP13 various cultural activities are organized in Marseille and neighboring cities (Aix en Provence, Arlon, Salon de Provence) to promote the region in France and to other European countri...