Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Teach Storytelling to Middle School Students- YES!

Saying yes to teaching a spring vacation storytelling class was a "no brainer", as the kids say. I love helping kids discover their voice and the power of story.....


Day One

 Four rotations will come to me over the course of the day. Each group will have a high school aged guide. They will stay with me for one hour, then move on to the next art offered in this Vacation Arts Experience sponsored by EastConn  an educational service.  www.eastconn.org  I must introduce the stories and engage them in activities that bring them back wanting more. We need  to get a story framework in their head in under an hour.

A group arrives all the desks have stories on them in print, they all look alike from the door.  We introduce ourselves around and mention a favorite story we have seen, heard, or read.  They have  3 minutes to read the intro to the story." GET UP AND MOVE TO A NEW DESK AND STORY" We take several rotations and already a couple students are hugging a story not wanting to leave it. I allow them to keep what they have been attracted to. 4th  desk, if they haven't found one I make some suggestions and share some books that might entice a student.  Everyone has a story, now we can read through to the end.

Project Time - Getting our Hands on the Stories

This Play-Doh creation blew me away!
This is the story of the Christmas Truce during WWI near Ypres, France. Note the German's Christmas tree, wounded soldier in "no mans land" and soldiers in trenches. 30 minutes, start to finish and he understood the story! Try this link to read a version of event:  http://www.firstworldwar.com/features/christmastruce.htm


While some students worked in Play-Doh others were making cut and paste murals from magazine pictures. On the second day they will switch and make the other project.

            Here a student with a finished mural tells a friend his story, this one tells of El Coqui the little frogs of Puerto Rico  and the race where they earned their singing voice. Here is a link to the legend:
http://voices.yahoo.com/el-coqui-native-frog-puerto-rico-5306039.html 

                                                   
Here a student laid out her version of events from Chris Allsburg's " The Widow's Broom".  http://www.amazon.com/The-Widows-Broom-Chris-Allsburg/dp/0395640512

Felt boards were used for other students who again tried a different hands on the story project on day 2.

Come back soon or follow to find out about day 2 and day 3 of the Vacation Arts Experience/ Storytelling with Carolyn Stearns Storyteller.
www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.com


another post about story and education:

http://www.carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2012/01/school-day-and-story-night.html



                              

6 comments:

  1. Bravo! What wonderful work and sharing of it. So so happy to hear of vacation arts events like this - and STORYTELLING - Yeah!

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    1. Thanks Marni, it was a great way to expand storytelling and listening, they also had breakdance, shadow puppets, musical instrument making and modeling clay islands.

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  2. Bravo! fabulous ideas. I have done murals before but never playdough! Love!

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    1. Play-Doh was awesome, I might be inclined to make salt clay too if I had the time with them. With one hour we were doing everything the quick way. Watch for future posts I used a couple of your games, with credit to you!

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  3. I'm delighted to hear about this. It helps repair the world.

    A minor point: Ypres is in Belgium, rather than France. Belgium is bilingual, so Ypres is the French spelling of the city's name, and in Flemish it is spelled Ieper.

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    1. Jacob, Thanks for the GPS location help. The version I had printed did not go into detail and because those on the allied trenches were French and English I was assuming France. Several students were intrigued with this story. I printed out a simplified version as this was grades 5-8 and no pictures.

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