In areas of educational, social and moral development, the power of ‘story-telling’ remains unsurpassed. It is an important avenue of effective communication and learning between parent and child; teacher and pupil. ‘Everyone and Everything’ are short punchy stories that maintain the interest of the 5-9 year-old child.
‘Story-telling’ stimulates the imaginative and creative processes of the mind and body and makes more things possible than would otherwise be achieved without it. To storytell about issues concerning behaviour that creates everyday problems for the child reader and which can relate to emotions that the child finds difficult to healthily express is a sure-fire way of grabbing their attention time span.
The ten stories in ‘Everyone and Everything’ were written for the 5-9-year-old reader in 1990. While they helped to raise a lot of money through their sales for ‘Children in Need’ during November, 1990, their true value is that they can greatly assist in the improvement of aggressive and tense behaviours by children today.
I wanted all of the stories I wrote in ‘Everyone and Everything’ to embrace and include the basic principles of Relaxation Training methods and Anger Management aspects of behaviour. As the original founder of ‘Anger Management’ courses in Great Britain during the early 70s and a leading exponent and instructor of Relaxation Training since the age of 22 years, I felt suitably equipped to write about those aspects of behaviour.
‘Everyone and Everything’ was my very first published children’s book and proved so popular with children, class-room teachers and school heads that approximately 4,000 copies were sold within the Kirklees Community during November, 1990 alone.
‘Everyone and Everything’ went on to prove so popular with heads of schools in subsequent years, not only because of the issues the stories raised, but because of their length and language used. They were easy to read and be read to, and for busy head teachers, the stories could be used ideally within a ten-minute morning-assembly slot.
I offer this book freely as an e-book and would advise the school teachers and head teachers of our Primary School Children to consider the merits of reintroducing some of the stories therein to their future school assemblies. I would also ask any downloader of this book who enjoys its content, to promote its readership base and to make a small donation to the Children in Need Appeal next November.
William Forde 22nd May, 2012
