Outcomes of Restorative Storytelling Training include:

• the ability to instantly read any room of diverse listeners

• maintain optimistic and calm confidence with challenging conversations

• mastery of a wide range of storytelling techniques

• a deep knowledge and appreciation of story mechanics

• ability to instantly calibrate prepared content to meet the needs of a listener

• finding the most powerful image that will yield the most enduring transformation

• pure joy when speaking


The goal of Restorative Storytelling is to help teachers, parents and change-makers who commonly:



• Do not have adequate time and reserves to do what is needed while maintaining personal balance 
• Can be overwhelmed by the needs of those with different learning profiles, behavior issues and complex social dynamics.
• Are insecure and feel vulnerable about the content and curriculum being welcoming and inclusive enough for a diverse community.
• Feel like nothing ever goes how you want it to go. The students get unhinged, parents get offended and colleagues are overly sensitive.



Restorative Storytelling Faculty

David Sewell McCann
Lead Teacher

I've been working with narrative my whole life, and it has become my matrix and context for just about everything. I've been a painter, a filmmaker, an elementary school teacher, an author, and writer/teller for Sparkle Stories, and over and over again, I have found storytelling to be the most enduring and clarifying form of connection. It works when nothing else can, and it is teachable.

Meredith Markow
Adjunct Movement and Admin

I have been a classroom teacher for over thirty years and now I combine my education experience and training with certifications in Living Inquiry Methods, Enneagram and Feldenkrais Awareness through Movement to support Restorative Storytelling training and storytelling and superhero courses for our online children's school Story Steps Education .



Jason Phelps
Adjunct Speech

I am a multi-disciplinary performer and teacher who has been involved in theatre, dance, music, commercial acting, voice-overs, and education for over 30 years.

Laura Geiger
Adjunct Clowning

Laura is an applied theatre practitioner, teacher, and artist tending the social soil to create peace, change, and connection. She offers tools from interpersonal somatics, movement arts, creative drama, and applied neuroscience to change the patterns within structures of oppression and help us occupy our concentric bodies of connection from the cell to the soul to the source and back again. Laura is an American who lives and works in Sweden where she sticks out like a clown even without the red nose.

Per Eisenman
Adjunct Dialogue

Per is a therapist practicing Open Dialogue family therapy with kids and families to co-create create new stories. I find that when we engage in dialogue together, the world around us shifts and we discover things that didn’t previously exist.

He and David collaborated on a popular storytelling card game called Tailors. You can get your own deck at Tailors Games.

Crystal Shelley
Adjunct Editing

Crystal Shelley is the owner of Rabbit with a Red Pen, where she provides editing and authenticity reading services to fiction authors. Drawing on her background as a licensed clinical social worker, she unites her love of language and her passion for social justice by advocating conscious language use and inclusive representation in her editorial work. She is the creator of the Conscious Language Toolkits for Editors and Writers and serves on the board of ACES: The Society for Editing. Connect with her on TwitterInstagram, and LinkedIn.

Other Ways to Experience Restorative Storytelling

Below you can read articles, watch videos and take individual courses. Children's courses also for sale on our Story Steps Education site.

Articles from David

Thoughts and essays on Restorative Storytelling and Storytelling in general published on Medium.com


Video tutorials

David and Meredith have created several series of videos that cover topics like:
The four pillars of storytelling
The temperaments
Storytelling and festivals
The five "fools"
"Heart Thinking"



Story Steps Education

David and Meredith teach virtual storytelling courses and camps to children around the world. New Courses in 2022.