Herstory + Candlelit Tales Workshops
These workshops are designed around the principles of Game-Based Learning as interactive games where students of all ages are introduced to the concepts and principles experientially rather than intellectually, letting them explore and play deep ideas in a secure, enjoyable experience. These workshops are designed to be adaptable to different age groups at different stages of their education. To book a workshop event for your school contact: candlelit.tales@gmail.com
What is our culture’s approach to wrongdoing, lawbreaking, and harm to individuals and community? Is there another way to look at justice and the law?
For centuries, Ireland operated without prisons or police, tackling legal issues through the Brehon law – a complex and fascinating legal code that focused on restorative rather than punitive justice.
In this workshop, students will test out the Brehon law by holding their own trial. They will experience the similarities and differences of this approach to our modern legal system, and will have a chance to explore a completely different approach to crime and punishment. They will be guided through some of the principles and processes of Brehon Law and will explore concepts of fair play, justice, and legality through a mock-trial.
Through this workshop, students will experience the concept of restorative justice in the context of a real legal code that held sway on this island for thousands of years.
2. The Fifth Province: the High Queens and Kings of Ireland
In the myths of Ireland, the whole island was ruled from the seat of the High Queens and Kings at Tara and Uisneach. But these were not rulers who enforced their will on the people: these were leaders chosen for their sense of justice who mediated between the lesser kings and queens of the provinces, counties, and tribes of Ireland.
The Fifth Province was said to be a place where everyone on the Island could meet, setting aside their grudges and tribal loyalties, to find ways forward to the benefit of all, and not just the few.
In this workshop, students will form into tribes, each with their own interests and enmities, and experience the effort that goes into listening and negotiating with those who have different priorities. They will have a chance to see how a distributed power structure might work for them, and where its challenges and possibilities lie.
3. Reawakening the Tuatha de Dannan: Ireland’s Lost Goddess Culture
The myths of Ireland contain tantalising glimpses of lost figures: Scathach, the greatest warrior in the world. Banba, Folda and Eiriu, the three goddesses who gave the land its name. Danu, the principle goddess of the Tuatha de Dannan.
This workshop will look at the stories we tell, at who tells them, and how we listen to and interpret them. Students will get to play with the ideas of language, power, and erasure to see how they can tell inclusive stories, and how they can critically engage with the stories they hear.
Students will experience how powerful and persuasive a simplistic story can be, and will uncover the nuances of the truth, and how those overlooked can complicate a dominant narrative, throwing received certainties into question.
4. The Warrior Code: Deconstructing Toxic Stereotypes
There are codes of conduct, implicit and explicit, that govern our lives and our attitudes. Some of these are spoken, but many are unspoken. Some are enforced by authority figures, some by our peers, and still others by our own internal sense of what is acceptable. These codes can become toxic and destructive, causing harm to those who follow them and to those who rebel.
In this workshop, students will experience the ways that rules can be handed down to become unspoken assumptions, and the effects those rules have on society and culture. They will have the chance to play out some of the ancient codes of warriors in ancient myths, and experience some of the consequences: positive and negative.
At the end of this workshop, students will choose their own “code” – the set of rules and aspirations that they want to live by, for the world that they want to create.
5. A Hundred Thousand Welcomes: Ireland’s Ancient Immigrants
Ireland has long been a land of immigration and emigration; of exile and return. Our oldest myths tell us that the Irish are the people who came from elsewhere. Repeatedly driven from their homes, only to return once again to struggle to reclaim their place.
In this workshop, students will experience the clash of cultures, coming together as different peoples, and will be offered a variety of approaches to see how best to live and work together as a new community. They will explore the conflicts, tensions, and benefits of a multicultural society, and will decide how they want to live up to the motto of the “land of a hundred thousand welcomes.”