SparkleCast! Our new Podcast for Parents and Educators
We just launched a brand new Podcast -- for Adults!
SparkleCast is a half-hour podcast in which we explore the ways stories can be used as gentle and effective parenting tools.
In each episode we invite an expert or thought-leader to join us in the conversation!
You'll also get to meet Rebecca, the Sparkle production manager (and a performance artist in her own right). She brings her clarity and gift for facilitation to the SparkleCast mix.
The Podcast Plan
One week we'll share a new story. (This story will mirror what's on the Sparkle Free Story Podcast.)
Then the next week we'll "unpack" that story with an expert that specializes in the theme. We'll talk about why we produced it and then discuss how the story can be ‘used’ in the home or classroom.
Find the iTunes Preview here!
Here's what's ready and waiting for you in iTunes!
Episode One
Story: “The Dragon and the Unicorn” from the By Thistle By Thimble Series
Expert: Dr. Carrie Contey, a parenting expert who specializes in helping families navigate big emotions. (She's helped us immensely in our own parenting!)
We discuss ways to better observe and be with our children – and how to foster healthy ‘dragons’ or emotional expression – as well as strengthening our ‘unicorns’ or objective presence.
Tools:
How to feel and healthily navigate big emotions yourself.
The value of curiosity in Conscious Parenting
How to help children manage their own strong emotions, including tantrums.
Episode Two
Story: “The Dark” from the Martin & Sylvia Series
Expert: Sensei Jonathan Hewitt, author and founder of Life Kido martial arts and life skills.
We discuss how children can ground themselves in their bodies when they are feeling ‘out of sorts’ – and offer practical ways in which children can find calm during a Halloween season of darkness and fear.
Tools:
Body awareness using the “Ice, Puddle and River” analogy
How the senses can be used for self-regulation
The three “B’s” (body, breathing and brain) used to create calm and ‘flow’
Episode Three
Story: “Someone Else’s Dragon” from the By Thistle By Thimble Series
Expert: Renee Jain, founder and chief storyteller for GoZen.com – an online anxiety relief program.
We discuss how storytelling can not only change perspectives but help them face fears, dismantle panic and undo patterns of anxiety.
Tools:
How to listen to the little guidance inside yourself
Making room for ‘darker’ emotions and embracing fear
The “laddering” approach to meeting difficult thresholds
Find the iTunes Preview here!
Listen and discuss!
The discussion can continue on our new Facebook Group:
Here you'll be able to share your experience and ask clarifying or follow-up questions.
(Click here to join now!)
A Giveaway, of course!
We would love your help in sharing the word to other parents, teachers and care-givers. So let's make it fun!
Prize: a One-Year Sparkle Stories subscription to THREE listeners!
How to Enter:
Listen to one of the episodes and then do any of the following:
- Rate and review the podcast in iTunes. (Instructions below.)
- Subscribe to the podcast.
- Talk about the podcast with friends.
Then visit the SparkleCast Conversations Facebook Group and enter your name in the Giveaway in the SparkleCast Giveaway post at the very top.
For each action above, make one comment on the Giveaway post letting us know what you did (for up to three comments).
In other words, if you choose one of the above, make one comment. If you do all three, make three separate comments. Those equal three separate entries!
(Click here to visit the SparkleCast Facebook page!)
This Giveaway closes October 28 at midnight CST. Winners will be notified Monday, October 31st!
Why do we ask you to do help us in this way?
iTunes gives new podcasts a 4 week window to get noticed and featured. They have a particular algorithm that checks how many people are listening, subscribing and reviewing – and the more we get in the next couple weeks, the higher our ranking.
And the higher our ranking, the more people will notice.
And the more people notice, the more they discover the most effective (and nourishing) parenting tool available: storytelling!
This is the way you helped the Sparkle Free Story Podcast win Best of iTunes in 2013!
Join us!
This new podcast can be a place to celebrate stories and how effective they can be in families, classrooms and places of healing. We hope it offers new tools to you as well!
Find the iTunes Preview here.
HOW TO RATE A PODCAST in iTUNES
From an iPhone or iPad:
- Launch Apple's Podcast app.
- Tap the Search tab.
- Enter the name of the podcast you want to rate or review.
- Tap the blue Search key at the bottom right.
- Tap the album art for the podcast.
- Tap the Reviews tab.
- Tap Write a Review at the bottom.
On a Mac or PC:
- Open iTunes.
- If you're not signed in, sign in with your Apple ID.
- Click iTunes Store.
- Find the item that you want to review, then click Ratings and Reviews.
- Under Customer Reviews, click Write a Review.
- Enter a title, select a star rating, write your review, then click Submit.
