Pilot project presentations: The Storytellers Project

17:30-17:45 Welcome and introduction
(Francesco Molinari, ANCI Toscana)
17:45-18:15 Presentation of the pilot project
(Laura Boffi)
18:15-18:30 Q&A and Discussion (*)
18:30 End

(*) Other winners of the Designscapes call with similar thematic orientation will be invited to contribute

Our speakers

Francesco Molinari is an international researcher and policy advisor with a 20-years working experience in R&D and innovation projects and programmes at European, national and regional levels – notably on such topics as eParticipation, eGovernment and Smart Cities. Formerly he has been engaged for about 12 years in territorial marketing and the delivery of financial services to SMEs – including support to EU grants access for their green and brown field investments. For 5 years he has served in a top managerial position at a middle-sized Municipality in Italy. He holds a track record of successful collaborations with local/regional authorities and ministries on such topics as Pre-Commercial Public Procurement, Living Labs and Smart Specialisation.

Laura Boffi is an interaction design researcher and practitioner with a background in product design. She likes engaging with people in their own context, conducting fieldwork and involving them in design games, workshops and co-creation sessions that she designs expressly for the projects to gain meaningful insights. She holds a BA in industrial design from the Polytechnic of Turin, a MA in Design from the Design Academy Eindhoven and a diploma in Interaction Design from the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design CIID. Laura collaborates from her own studio as interaction designer and researcher with international companies and consultancies, takes part in EU funded projects, as well as gives invited lectures & workshops in academia. She nurtures own design interests through self-initiated projects, which eventually manages to fund through public grants or funds and private sponsorships, such as the case of her recent endeavour “The Storytellers Project” which was funded by the EU. Since 2018, Laura holds a Phd scholarship from the University of Ferrara to pursue her design research on the social implications of the introduction of autonomous cars, with the technical collaboration of Ericsson R&D, Italy.

The Storytellers Project is a library service that connects a community of adult readers (the Storytellers) to young children and their families for remote reading aloud sessions. Children use the Storybell robot at home to connect with readers willing to read. The Storybell robot transmits their reading live, allowing children and readers to speak and interact as on the phone.

Thanks to the Designscapes funding, Phase 2, The Storytellers project was piloted between December and September 2020 in the public library of Empoli and involved 5 families with children between 3 and 11 years old, and 8 adult readers. The pilot began with four workshop sessions for library staff and senior readers about benefits and approaches in intergenerational Learning involving young children and older adults, interactive reading and children’s literature. A training course for the Storytellers involved the 8 adult readers, mostly delivered remotely, yet live, due to the Covid-19 lockdown. 5 Prototypes of the Storybell, as well as the mobile app for the Storytellers and the mobile app for the parents have been built. In the following months, the children and readers took part in 23 remote reading sessions.

Children, parents and readers were all enthusiastic about the experience and expressed their wish to participate in the Storytellers project beyond the pilot, although they experienced some frustration due to the prototypes not fully working.

The Storybell was the main attraction for children. They had a new, interactive, almost magical toy at home, which could connect them to a stranger reader and allow them to listen to a story and engage in playful conversations.

Below, some quotes from the participants are reported.

“My child discovered the pleasure of imagination and curiosity: imagining what was going to be read to her and being curious about who would read it to her” says P., mother of Z (5 years old).

“Participating in this project makes me feel good. I feel new emotions: when I see the phone ringing and I read for example ‘Storybell number 3’, I say ‘Oh gosh, the Storybell!’. Then I stop whatever I am doing and pick up the call immediately. One time I left my dinner on the table” says A., storyteller, 54 years old.