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Talking Storytelling

Classroom Storytelling Texts

Available at: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/sites/teacheng/files/J157_Creating%20an%20inclusive%20school%20environment%20report_FINAL_web.pdf?fbclid=IwAR22K0XX25omA7QQAACDxiADivDVtzilpvHf9VrNhrS5SqB6Cl-lpvfcx6s (accessed 29/3/22)

From the introduction to this chapter:
'Humans are primed for telling and being told stories. Neuroscientist Antonio
Damasio writes, ‘Storytelling is something brains do, naturally and implicitly …
it pervades the entire fabric of human societies and cultures.’ We filter the
information we are bombarded with every day and make sense of what we retain
in the form of narrative. This is true not only of personal stories, but also of stories
from the world’s oral cultures; folk tales, myths and legends have been honed
by communities over generations and draw on collective experience to convey
universal truths. These stories tell us about who we are, our values and our
aspirations. Since the exchange of knowledge began, being passed on by our
earliest ancestors, storytelling has been an effective educational tool. It takes
us beyond boundaries of ethnicity, language, culture and gender so we can
imagine being anyone and anywhere while we are engrossed in a tale.'

'Storytelling for diverse voices' in 'Creating an inclusive school environment', edited by Susan Douglas

David Heathfield and Alla Göksu

Chapter Introduction:
In recent years, classroom storytelling has, to a certain extent, been linked with the Primary National Strategies (PNS) Talk for Writing materials (2008) and, with the demise of the PNS as a policy document in 2010, and the subsequent arrival of the new National Curriculum in 2014 (Department for Education (DfE), 2013), there is a danger that teachers may no longer see the relevance of storytelling to their classroom practice. However, storytelling is embedded within the National Currriculum (DfE, 2013) within both the mandatory guidance for spoken language and areas of reading comprehension (see below), and it is in the context of these expectations of the National Curriculum that this chapter explores the role of the teacher as the principal storyteller in a classroom community of storytellers.

'Teachers and Children: A Classroom Community of Storytellers' in 'Unlocking Speaking and Listening: Developing Spoken Language in the Primary Classroom' (third edition) edited by Deborah Jones and Pamela Hodson

Alastair K Daniel

This book is the story of a teacher who decided to try a new teaching recipe for groups of boys ages eight to eighteen, and who discovered that she could cook up a storm. Ingredients: a loving teacher; an oral tradition; a wealth of stories, including the Greek myths; a multi-language, multi-race, multi-cultural group of boys not confident about their abilities.

And None Of It Was Nonsense

Betty Rosen

'This book provides everything you need to become a master storyteller yourself. Simple examples and summary directions for exercises and games reinforce and demonstrate key concepts. Step-by-step plans help you choose a story, and learn it in preparation for presentation to an audience. Audience management, practice activities, and the authors' motivation exercises are offered as are techniques to guide you through any of the possible major telling problems. Storytelling extras (props to puppets including costumes) and lists of grade-appropriate, time- and teller-tested stories are provided.'

Crash Course in Storytelling

Kendal Haven and MaryGay Ducey

Stories can empower children to take action and ask for help, including help with changes and life-plans. Stories provide a secure structure with endings and closure. The book develops the following topics:

Stories for assessment
Stories for understanding emotions
Stories for exploring the senses
Stories for managing loss
Stories for ritual and drama

There are new and revised stories, in particular addressing trauma and abuse. This book is written for all those people with the welfare of children as their priority.

Creative Storytelling with Children at Risk

Sue Jennings

'Jack Zipes has reinvigorated storytelling as a successful and engaging tool for teachers and professional storytellers. Encouraging storytellers, librarians, and schoolteachers to be active in this magical process, Zipes proposes an interactive storytelling that creates and strengthens a sense of community for students, teachers and parents while extolling storytelling as animation, subversion, and self-discovery.'

Creative Storytelling: Building Community/Changing Lives

Jack Zipes

'Developing Early Maths through Story offers step-by-step advice for using storytelling as a springboard for early maths. It uses traditional stories outlines and folktales from around the world together with tried-and-tested strategies to encourage children to engage with simple mathematical operations through the stories they love. The logic behind this approach is that mathematics and stories help children (and adults!) to understand the world. Both provide order, pattern and frameworks through which children can access meaning and make maths more fun! The book contains 14 chapters, on numbers 0 to 13 each including: the outline of the story; EYFS learning objectives; Resources needed; Scope for outdoor activities and for using natural materials; Suggestions for using ICT. Ideal for 3-5 years olds, it includes activities for younger children and babies.'

Developing Early Maths Through Story: Step-By-Step Advice for Using Storytelling as a Springboard for Maths Activities

Marion Leeper

'Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin. Stories are powerful things to all cultures and throughout all of history. Stories can heal, inspire, delight, enrage, but ultimately change our views of ourselves, other people and the world around us. Will Coleman knows this - as a storyteller, educational consultant, and, the founder of Brave Tales, a company that uses storytelling as a medium to explore and support the ways in which children make sense of their world. This book introduces the powerful techniques of storytelling and story boarding in developing literacy and nurturing creativity and collaboration in the classroom. The accompanying DVD features film footage of children using the techniques in the classroom. And they all lived happily ever after. The End.'

Developing Literacy through Storytelling

Will Coleman

Stories are an essential part of children’s life. And they are a means for parents,teachers, caregivers and educators to take care of children and their cognitive, emotional and communicative development. This book presents resources,strategies and techniques that can support storytelling activities for an informal,involving and enriching approach to English as a foreign/second language for children. It addresses teachers, student teachers, educators, parents, caregivers, librarians and volunteer narrators interested in storytelling with children in English L2.

Let's Tell a Tale: Storytelling with Children in English L2

Elisa Bertoldi and Maria Bortoluzzi

'Learning how to write and tell a story to an audience directly supports several speaking/listening, reading, and writing Common Core Standards. Teaching to the standards is effortless, motivating, and engaging when storytelling is part of the K-8 teaching week.. Mini-lessons at beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels help teachers weave storytelling into the fabric of today's standards-based classroom and construct their own skilful literacy lessons. Reluctant and striving readers and writers, English language learners, and even more advanced storytellers will love the confidence they gain as they move from developing to delivering a variety of stories for a variety of audiences. '

Performance Literacy through Storytelling

Nile Stanley and Brett Dilllingham

Stories and fantasy play engage all young children and help them to draw connections and make sense of the world. MakeBelieve Arts Helicopter Stories are tried, tested and proven to have a significant impact on children’s literacy and communication skills, their confidence and social and emotional development. Based on the storytelling and story acting curriculum of Vivian Gussin Paley, this book provides a practical, step-by-step guide to using this approach with young children.

Princesses, Dragons and Helicopter Stories

Trisha Lee

'Drawing on primary and contemporary research, and presented by a range of experienced authors, this book covers important topics such as:

- The benefits of regularly practising storytelling
- Storytelling during play activities
- Group dynamics in constructing narratives
- The roles of props and fantasy concepts in storytelling

This accessible guide is ideal for all early years practitioners looking to encourage literacy, communication and well-being in a supportive and creative environment, and for policymakers looking to develop best practice in the early years classroom.'

Putting Storytelling at the Heart of Early Childhood Practice

Edited by Tina Bruce, Lynn McNair and Jane Whinnett

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