Multi-sensory storytelling: a tool for teaching or an intervention technique

This article reports on research undertaken to investigate how multisensory storytelling (MSST) was being used within schools for students with profound and multiple learning difficulties and other special educational needs. Semi-structured interviews (n=27) and observations (n=18) were undertaken in five schools in the East Midlands and south-east of England. The study identified that MSST was considered to contribute to the curriculum access, assessment, learning and socialisation of students across a wide range of special educational needs. Key opportunities, applications and barriers to use were identified. Findings from this study indicated that the way these teachers used MSST differed from extant research in this area with regard to both design and delivery. It is suggested that the desire to develop a quantitative evidence base may present unnecessary restrictions which inhibit the recognition of pedagogic issues; and that a more fluid conceptualisation of MSST would be reflective of real-world practice.