Words: Sarah Stone, Director and Founder of Stone Barrell
It’s only a matter of time before I quit my day job to become a primary school teacher… that’s how much we loved filming at St Ebbe’s.
A big commission, a limited budget. When you focus on supporting small nonprofits and values-driven organisations, that’s a brief you get pretty used to. St Ebbe’s CofE Primary School in Oxford was no exception. Headteacher Tina Farr wanted to share the school’s unique approach to education and the positive impact it’s having on their students with the parents of potential future pupils – and inspire other educators at the same time. As professional storytellers who specialise in supporting organisations doing good in our city and the world, the more we learned about what’s happening at Ebbe’s the more we wanted to be involved.
Stone Barrell’s proposal:
- 🎒One jam-packed day of filming and photography (to maximise what we could do with the budget)
- 🍿 Five short videos for St Ebbe’s to use on their social channels and website to promote the school’s USPs
- 🗞️ One press pack to raise awareness of the positive impact of adventurous play on children’s mental health ahead of the school holidays
It was always going to be an epic filming day – shooting passion assemblies and playtimes, forest school and after school club, as well as children learning a curriculum of hope in and outside their classrooms. Add to that a LOT of interviews with pupils, parents and teachers, and pre-scripted content to anchor the videos, and we were absolutely knackered by home time. But we left seriously inspired too.
You can see two of the videos we created with St Ebbe’s on this blog, or watch all five on our YouTube channel. We really tried to capture the heart of St Ebbe’s and show what makes them so special – have a watch and let us know what you think!
The impact
The three videos released so far by St Ebbe’s Primary on their Facebook page have been shared nearly 50 times and viewed by more than 6,600 people. They’ve had on average 4x more views than other videos posted by the school and the comments across social channels have been lovely too. Things like:
- Loving the video content. It's great to have such vivid insights into many of the brilliant things we might otherwise fail to see. (Mark)
- This is so inspiring. Thanks for sharing. #BeMoreStEbbes (Roy)
- I love how the outside world is getting an insight into the fantastic St Ebbes. Wonderful way of sharing pupil voice too 🥰 (Laura)
On top of the five short social videos which have been being gradually released since the start of the September 2024 term, we also made a press pack about St Ebbe’s approach to play in July, sending it to Oxfordshire media to encourage parents to prioritise adventurous play when possible over the summer.
The press pack included:
- A 4-minute video interview with Tina about the benefits of play for children’s mental health, how St Ebbe’s has prioritised high-quality play during the school day, and Tina’s advice to parents
- A press release entitled Let your children get bored – Oxford headteacher’s message to parents this summer holiday
- Photos to include with any articles published
The story got picked up by a number of local media outlets and Tina was interviewed on BBC Radio Oxford. As well as raising the profile of St Ebbe’s, getting this story out there meant more people learned about ways to help children build resilience – and, in the middle of what is often described as a children’s mental health crisis, that’s important.
Happy (and inspiring!) clients = happy Stone Barrell
Tina and the staff, students and parents at St Ebbe’s were all an absolute dream to work with. And oh my word are those kids accomplished! We had an absolute blast working on this project, and we’re very pleased to say the school felt the same way.
On working with us, Tina says:
“Sarah and Jake worked in a sensitive and compassionate way with our staff and children from our first meeting to the end of production. They listened to and were genuinely interested in us from the start, showing a real understanding of our vision and values. The films they have made are really beautiful and present our work in its best possible light. I would highly recommend working with them.” ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Thanks team Ebbe’s, we’ll come back anytime!
We love working with values-driven organisations.
Why? Because your work is important and it’s a privilege to be a small part of it. Helping you show your organisation at its very best and raising awareness and support for your cause. Also, because in our experience, people who are doing good in the world are brilliant to work with – passionate about what you do, driven to get word out about it through great content, and generally quite lovely too.
Want to collaborate on a video project? Drop us a message – it will be fun!
