I walked away from today’s drama workshop with ONE message that struck me.
I felt really motivated to BE a teacher who has the gift of storytelling. I want to take up the challenge that Egan (1997) suggests – which is to “reconceive the curriculum as a set of great stories we have to tell children and recognise… school teachers as the storytellers of our culture” (p. 64).
I experienced the enchanting and engaging effect that storytelling had not only just as listeners but also as storytellers. I absolutely loved how we could all get creative with the storytelling process. Students would be given free reign to imagine their own stories as the story can undergo several changes and hence differ with each re-telling. The workshop fleshed out this idea focusing on the use of storytelling as a way of connecting (meanings, subject matter, ourselves) to the listener.
I’m really keen to do the story-telling activity in class with Stages 2 and 3 in the future.
Steps:
1. Teacher provides the bare bones of The Selkie Myth by acting and dramatizing the story.
2. Have a chat about how they felt as listeners. Were they engaged? What hooked them?
3. In pairs, the students retell the story. One student does the telling and the pair can either say to advance or ask for more detail.
For example, when students ask for detail, it would mean that the teller should create as much detail for that moment in story. “There was a fisherman, who had ginger curly hair falling to his shoulders. He was middle aged and had yellow teeth. He had a big beard that is long and wispy.”
For advance, move the story forward.
Further related activities could be getting students to bring a story from their home to tell.
At the end of the session, time permitting, teachers could do a ‘Conscience alley’ to decide what the Selkie does when she gets her skin back. Should she leave her family? Yes or No.
A great link to literacy would be to write new ending.
References:
Egan, K. (1997). The educated mind: How cognitive tools shape our understanding. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.