| Programs Offered |
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Dana L.Taylor-Nabawi, M.S.Ed., an Educational Consultant with more than 25 years of experience in teaching, interpreting, counseling, and interpretive dance, presents this fun, participatory workshop designed for public agencies, educational institutions and performance venues. The focus is on Deaf culture awareness, American Sign Language and sensitivity to individuals who are Deaf. With the assistance of performance-artist storyteller, J'miah Nabawi, participants learn to sign some helpful phrases and vocabulary through folk and popular music, storytelling, song, and nursery rhymes. Dana also also presents workshops for C.E.U.'s on ADHD and strategies for success for students and adults with special needs. |
| Using a variety of voices, sounds and audience participation as The Storybook Man!, J'miah Nabawi brings storybooks alive with animation and characterizations. This is a touring, read-aloud program with Readers Theater as a welcomed component that incorporates the elements and antics of performance storytelling. A recommended companion and supplement to many of the national America Reads initiatives intent on having children reading well by 3rd Grade. It also a great model for adult literacy and parent-to-child activities and programs that connects with workshops on Reading and Family Literacy.The Storybook Man! was initially conceived by J'miah in 1996 during a READ BOSTON literacy campaign. It was then realized in the summer of 2000 when he was chosen as the featured storybook reader and storyteller for the NFL Philadelphia Eagles' Summer Youth Partnership in collaboration with the Children's Literacy Initiative (CLI) and Philadelphia Read, visiting camp sites, shelters, schools, vacationing reading centers and youth programs for a variety ofcommunities in Philadelphia, Chester, PA and Camden, N.J. and their surrounding areas. J'miah was recently invited by the Eagles Youth Partnership to be their Official Storybookman in Jacksonville, Florida during the NFL Eagles' 2005 Supperbowl appearances and championship game |
| J'miah The Storybook Man! at Malcolm X Park (Roxbury, MA) for READ BOSTON, a literacy program sponsored by the City of Boston (MA) and Boston Public Library. The Storymobile he travels throughtout the city on is in the background. |
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| The Days When The Animals Talked |
| This rhythmic and historically based discussion/performance introduces the audience to the life and works of the late Reverend Dr.William J. Faulkner and the coded Brer Rabbit folktales, riddles and anectdotes used by African captives to denounce the system of slavery. As a boy growing up on a farm in Society Hill, S.C., Faulkner first heard these stories from Simon Brown, an African descendant who had been enslaved on a plantation in Virginia. Decades later, remembering all but a few of the folktales and stories, Reverend Faulkner published his childhood memories of Simon Brown and the protest tales of Brer Rabbit (unfound in the Uncle Remus cycles) in his book: The Days When The Animals Talked. |
| Story, Song, Sign and Dance |
| Here comes The Storybook Man! |
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| Wood Makes Music! is a marimba-making (xylophone-type) craft project designed to introduce participants to the sonorous properties of wood and instrument making. Here, Art and Science work together to introduce and/or review the topics of wood types, ecology, tree conservation, basic math concepts and more, in a fun-filled way that helps students learn specialized knowledge and process to construct their very own marimba or xylophone. The Wood Makes Music! project is infuses several disciplines and makes curriculum connections to meet National Standards on a variety of grade levels. The program was conceived and designed by Mr. Nabawi in response to a national exhibit entitled, "What Makes Music?" and presented during his artist-in-residence at The Franklin Institute Planetarium and Science Museum in Philadelphia, PA. Since then, Wood Makes Music! has been cited by the Pennsylvania House of Representatives for its educational value and presented at folk and craft festivals and arts-in-education residencies to provide new and innovative Maths and Science experiences.The learn-and-let's-have-fun-with-art-and-science efforts of Wood Makes Music! often culminates with a synergistic student-ensemble performance of marimba playing, storytelling and song. Program availability is limited as sufficient time is required to prepare the wood and its tuning as well as scheduling the classrooms and core-group participation. Residencies of at least 5 days are suggested for sponsors interested in developing a core-group for performances. Hear the joyous sounds and rhythms of a Wood Makes Music! Nabawi-made marimba by listening to The Baby Leopard, an audio-book/cassette written and narrated by Linda and Clay Goss, published by Bantum Doubleday Books. |
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| During a residency, J'miah shows the students how to tie down the frame of one of the xylophones being built. |
| A student nears completion of a xylophone as he ties down the keys. |
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| New Programs!: "Hola Kuumba: Hello Creativity!" and its description can be viewed in Young Audiences of Atlanta Programs Guide. "The Community Story-Cloth Project: Tela de Cuentos" is another new listing. Meanwhile, take a sneak peak and listen to a Nabawi-esque musical garden that was featured at Jasper Elementary, a"Character Through The Arts" |
| Photo by Charlene Rexford |
| Webpage designed and maintained by Mark Darby and Pam Thomas. |
| Photos courtesy of Debbie Marteslo/Blue Mountain School District Orwigsburg, PA |
| The "S.S.A.N.E." Initiative is "student-supported arts-'n-education" programming that was begun in the early nineties by J'miah Nabawi as a means to sustain arts-based education and artists affected by "the-first-to-go" curriculum and arts-based classes e.g. music, the visual arts, and dance because of budgetary restraints and financial cutbacks. Now in partnership with the William J. Faulkner Friends of Folklore and The Friends of Folklore of The Americas Inc., Mr. Nabawi continues to make it possible for public schools operating with very limited financial resources and agency-support to host an arts-in-eduation residency. Teacher-lead student groups and school PTA's fund-raise in their variety of creative ways and contribute to a designated arts initiatives piggy-bank. The money will be used for artists fees, material and supplies, whatever else is needed to make things happen.Students (the school) take the "initiative" to support their own arts-interests and goals in the midsts of government cutbacks initially used for arts programs and spending. The universally proven benefits of The Arts on learning and education are no longer questionable. . . . SUPPORT THE ARTS!!! For more information contact speakersgroup@bellsouth.net Coming soon>>>>>> Angela Lindsay and The Ready for Learning Club! |