Why Storytelling Can/Should Be Anywhere/Everywhere
Cross posted on the TechLearning Advisory Blog.
Why can storytelling be anywhere?
Why should storytelling be everywhere?
As you can tell, if you have been reading my blog for a while, I am enthralled with Digital Storytelling (posts tagged with Digital Storytelling). Today, I am thinking NOT only about digital storytelling though. It is about integrating storytelling in any shape and form for teaching and learning.
I am intrigued and fascinated by the resurrection and increase in The Need for Storytelling Skills in the 21st century. In addition to finding a way to conquer information overload, one of the reasons might be the ability to adapt, tweak and make digital storytelling fit with so many different subjects areas and learning objectives.
How is it that storytelling is such a great tool that adapts and molds itself almost fluidly to learning and teaching?
Edutopia’s article by Jennifer New “How to Use Digital Storytelling in the Classroom” states that
Storytelling is a vital skill with seemingly unlimited applications. Done well, it can have a magical effect — moving, enlightening, or entertaining audiences of any size. We tell stories to woo lovers, calm children, or reassure ourselves. Lawyers rely on the power of storytelling to vividly re-create crimes to juries, archaeologists conjure former civilizations, and teachers make abstract concepts real to their students.
In the introduction chapter of “Digital Storytelling Tools for Educators”, I wrote.
Storytelling is also an ancient form of teaching . Before books, reading and writing became widely spread and available, oral storytelling was the only form the wisdom and knowledge of the people were passed down from elders to children
So storytelling, as a way of teaching and transmitting knowledge, is NOT a new idea. Our ancestors have been doing it for thousands of years.
Helen C. Berrett focuses in “Researching and Evaluating Digital Storytelling as a Deep Learning Tool“on how digital storytelling
facilitates the convergence of four student-centered learning strategies: student engagement, reflection for deep learning, project-based learning, and the effective integration of technology into instruction.
Jason Ohler mentions in his book Digital Storytelling in the Classroom: New Media Pathways to Literacy, Learning, and Creativity
Kids come to school already understanding the story form. Yet, what they encounter is information in report form, which lacks the rhythm and imagination that makes stories so involving. [...] If we view storytelling as an emerging ability, and seek to nurture it when students enter school, we can tap into communication structures they can already understand.
Read the following passage from “The Housekeeper and the Professor” by Yoki Ogawa, as an example of how storytelling can be used for any subject, facilitate understanding, connect and engage the learner with the content,
The author intertwines masterly math concepts in her narrative.
…”Two is the only even prime. It’s the lead off batter to the infinite team of prime numbers after it”. “That must be awfully lonely,”said Root. “Don’t worry,” said the Professor. “If it gets lonely, it has lots of company with the other even numbers.” [...]
“If numbers never end, then there should always be ore twins, right?” “That makes sense, Root. But when you get to much bigger numbers- a million or ten million–you are venturing into a wasteland where the primes are terribly far apart.” “A wasteland?” “That’s right, a desert. No matter how far you go, you don’t find any. Just sand as far as they eye can see. The sun shines down mercilessly, your throat is parched, your eyes glaze over. Then you think you see one, a prime number at last, and you go running toward it–only to find that it is a mirage, nothing but hot wind. Still, you refuse to give up, staggering on step by step, determined to continue to search…until you see it at last, the oasis of another prime number, a place of rest and cool, clear water…”
As a Word Language teacher, I taught with a method called “TPRS”, Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling, (originated by Blaine Ray and previously known as Total Physical Response Storytelling). It was the storytelling component, that made the language come alive and “memorable” –literally. Students were able to recall vocabulary and grammar structures more accurately and for longer periods of time than via the traditional method of memorizing long lists of vocabulary words and endless repetition of fill- in- the- blank grammar sentences.
Valeri Marsh writes that “Total Physical Response Storytelling: A Communicative Approach to Language Learning”
provides the critical vehicle–storytelling–for utilizing and expanding vocabulary. High-interest stories contextualize the vocabulary, enabling students to hear and see a story and then to act out, revise, and rewrite.
How are you using storytelling to teach and learn? What subject area or matter are you able to learn/teach better or deeper? What happens to internalizing a concept or content long term? Do you have examples of storytelling that made a difference in understanding where dry facts have or would have failed? I am interested in hearing your experience and field work. Please share.
Why can storytelling be anywhere?
Why should storytelling be everywhere?
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I’m finding success with digital storytelling this year with this project:
http://trailsoptional.wordpress.com/2009/09/19/animation-moodle-and-marvin-digital-storytelling-in-3d/
The students are finding their own story through a guided process using moodle, glogster, wallwisher, wordle, one note, and word.
The final digital story is being complied with 3D animation software called Marvin.
I’m sharing a link to a post I wrote about an international EFL digital storytelling project I carried out witha group of online colleagues.
Kind regards from Argentina
Carla Raguseo
Sorry! Here’s the right link!
I’ve been considering story telling as of late. I tried starting my school year by reading “Green Eggs and Ham” by Dr. Seuss as a way to encourage them to give my sometimes offbeat activities a chance. They got the point readily enough, but, to my surprise, both Grade 9 classes I read the story to applauded when I was done (unsolicited). They seemed to really enjoy a story, even at their age.
I love using story when I teach because I find it helps the creator and the listener move beyond assumption and stereotype well. For example, in my work as a literacy coach, I find that assumptions about assessment, the use of data, and differentiated instruction abound. When I begin conversations about these topics with story, it grounds our understandings in a context that teachers can relate to and appreciate, rather than in dry definitions that leave all of us less willing to explore good practices further. In my work as a teacher, I find that using story enables students to grasp concepts and engage in thinking around essential questions with a bit more passion. Stories speak to the heart of any matter we choose to explore.
[...] her Langwitches Blog recently, Silvia Tolisano wrote, “I am intrigued and fascinated by the resurrection and increase in [...]