Dragonfly Tales

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. Happy New Year! May 2021 bring you light, love and happiness. We have two wonderful wintry tales to see you through the cold dark evenings, and this episode we welcome guest storyteller Giles Abbot from London to the podcast. Giles is a writer and voice artist, but he became a storyteller about 20 years ago when he s...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. It's Christmas Eve! We are so excited and I hope we can get to sleep tonight! This episode we welcome guest storyteller Hannah Brailsford from Essex to the podcast. Hannah is a brilliant storyteller who is 'captivating, compelling, magic and fun'. She has been telling stories to both children and adults f...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas! This episode we welcome guest storyteller Joerg Steinkamper from Germany to the podcast. Joerg has been telling stories to all ages since 2009. He loves funny stories and his story is a modern version of an old Sufi tale featuring Nasruddin. If you would like to see Jo...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  Our sixth episode invites renowned storyteller Liz Weir MBE to the podcast. Liz has been telling stories for over 40 years and has told her captivating tales on five continents!!  She is also an author and has written three brilliant books: Boom Chica Boom, When Dad was Away and Here, There and Everywhere. If you wo...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. Our fifth episode is a tale from the lands of Ice and snow - a Norse myth. Norse myths are ancient stories of gods, goddesses, heroes and battles from Scandinavia. They were passed down to the Vikings and have had a lasting impression on us too! Our days of the week are named after Norse gods! In this story, the Thun...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. It's our Halloween Special! WOOOOOOOOO! We have two stories for you. What a TREAT - not a trick! Our first story is by Leo and is a version of the Hairy Toe. We found this version from master storyteller Margaret Read MacDonald , a very famous North American tale spinner who specialises in interactive storytellin...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  Our third episode is a tale from the East - a tale of mystical dragons. Eastern dragons are very different to those in stories from the west. In countries such as China, Korea and Japan, dragons are thought to be noble and wise, elemental gods that ruled over the skies and the oceans. They don’t have wings, and have...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. Our second episode is a classic Greek Myth about a brave hero who must defeat a hideous monster and escape a mysterious labyrinth. WARNING: it gets a bit scary when Theseus goes into the Labyrinth! For more great myths and legends, check out this fabulous collection by Anthony Horrowitz . If you fancy being a GUEST T...

Welcome to Season 2 of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. We're back! We hope you've had a lovely summer and are looking forward to some story fun. We will be releasing episodes every two weeks from now on - but don't worry. We have lots planned this season - Leo's Top Fives, guest storytellers and a spooky Halloween episode for half term! Our first episode...

Serpents, Sweets and Sausages Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.   This episode is our last one of the first season. We'll be taking a break for the summer but we'll be back in September for more story fun. For our finale, we bring you something a bit special - a special guest! Our friend Ella has been working on a story for our podcast and it...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode we head down to the sea in this beautiful story by Margaret Mahy. You find her story, and lots of other stories about pirates in this brilliant book The Kingfisher Treasury of Pirate Stories. Leo's activity this week is all about Pirates! Head over to the Royal Museums Greenwich website for...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. This episode we venture into the Amazonian rainforest to hear a story from the Anambe people. You can find a version of today's tale, 'Ceuci the Witch who ate a lot' in this book: Amazonia - Indigenous Tales from Brazil We'd also like to thank our lovely friend and fellow storyteller Sef Towns...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode we venture to Zimbabwe to hear a story from a clan of the Shona tribe - the Karanga! African storytelling is amazing and our telling would not have been possible without these two awesome books The Lion on the Path and Party Croc! Leo's activity this week is making banana bread - and it'...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode we had two stories! We hope you enjoyed Leo's excellent telling of The Frog and the Locust. It's a wonderful tale about working together and and making our voices heard to make the world a better place for everyone. We found it in this awesome book Earth Care . Our main story is from the...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. This episode our story is a Chinese version of a classic fairytale Little Red Riding Hood. But this one is a bit different. It was written by Isabelle Chang and can be found in this lovely book Womenfolk and Fairy Tales . Our activity this week is about the is all about the wonderful grey wolf! They are not a...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.   This episode comes from the fabulous collection - The Arabian Nights . The stories are told by the character Scheherazade, who tells a story every night for 1001 nights so that her husband, the King, will keep her alive. Yikes! The famous composer Rimsky Korsakov took several of the stories from the collect...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode, we have TWO animal tales for you.  The first one is a fable by Aesop, brilliantly told by Leo! If you like this short fable, you can read more of them in this book - Orchard Aesop's Fables . And the second one is The Bremen Town Musicians. This is a very popular folk tale in Germany, most f...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode, we are telling a folktale from Sicily , which is an island south of Italy. It has a volcano on the island, called Mount Etna! There are lots of versions of this type of folktale - but this is our version. If you would like to read more Sicilian Tales, we can recommend this lovely book Catarina...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. This episode, we are telling a tale written by the famous playwright William Shakespeare - The Tempest, which means the storm! It's a story about a mystical island far far away across the sea. If you'd like to find out more about William Shakespeare you can check out these  Shakespeare Fun Facts! And...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.   This episode, we introduce a classic story archtype - The Trickster! Anansi the spider is a trickster - he's sneaky, funny and a bit lazy too! The Anansi stories were first told by the Ashanti people in Ghana, a country in West Africa. They were not written but passed down through telling from generatio...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. This episode, our tale is THOUSANDS of years old. It’s a very long epic and we only had time to tell a part of it. If you liked the story and want to follow Odysseus on the rest of his journey, we’d recommend this version by Daniel Morden and Hugh Lupton – two amazing storytellers - The Adventures of Odysseus...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode is a classic tale from India – there are many different versions of this story, but our favourite is in this lovely Usbourne book of Indian tales . Here is a great link to Leo’s activity: Mango and Banana Smoothie. Ask a grown up for help with chopping and whizzing! Please please leave us a love...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a story podcast for children of all ages. This episode is a tale from Northern Ireland about the mystical and magical Faerie Thorn tree. I first heard the wonderful Liz Weir MBE tell a version of this at the Glens of Antrim Story Festival. Here are the instructions for making Leo’s fairy tree: You will need: ·    A big sheet of blank paper and a penc...

Welcome to the next episode of Dragonfly Tales, a new story podcast for children of all ages.  This episode is a tale from old Japan and features the Oni – they are Japanese trolls who live underground! There are lots of different versions of this story, but our favourite version is by Arlene Mosel . Here is the link to Leo's Sudoku puzzles . We'd love to see some of your own, along with a...

Welcome to the 3rd episode of Dragonfly Tales, a new story podcast for children of all ages. This episode is a tale from Australia! It's a beginning story, or a 'pourquoi' story. These stories explain why something is the way it is - do you think the story is true? You can find more lovely stories from the Australian Bush in the gorgeous book: Stories from the Billabong Here is the lin...