Imaginative Literacy - Storytelling in Storytime

Something has been slowly dawning on me over the past few months (ok, ok, things all dawn slowly anymore). In any case, I have been reading and following the discussions of storytime from bloggers, folks on Twitter and Facebook groups and youth librarians in chats in hallways at conferences. And a thing has got me wondering.

It seems like we are using far less oral storytelling in storytimes than we once did.  Mel's recent post at Mel's Desk details her solution to her recurring nightmare of needing a storytime in 3 minutes. She would tell many stories along with fingerplays and songs (all, I might say, brilliantly woven together as only Mel can do).

My reading eyes popped when I read her solution - it was ripe with oral storytelling, something I rarely see in storytime plans. Are we still using storytelling in storytimes with preschoolers?

I wonder because, as a long-time storyteller, I have watched how preschoolers discover the wonder of a story when their own imaginations provide the picture and context for the words being shared by the storyteller. Stories are powerful tools to spark the imagination of the listener.

I have long been troubled that kids get very little time to encourage their imagination in a world of provided images and experiences.  I don't dispute the wonder of books, media, digital images, art and other images that kids are exposed to. But I am wondering about whether we might want to take a step up and beyond these types of literacy sharing to delve into using the art of storytelling to spark and support imaginative literacy in our storytimes.

Just askin'. Just sayin'.

Hitting the Road

For some insanely crazy reason, the stars aligned and in a few weeks I'll be on a two week road trip of storytelling and workshop presentations.

You know that feeling that you get when you are invited to present six or eight months before the event? "Oh, yes, that would be outstanding!" And it is. Many months in the future, no problemo. And then another request comes in for a nearby date. "That would be outstanding!"  And it is. Still far off somewhere, easy-peasy. And then another request comes in, also in that window of previous bookings, and suddenly I'm thinking "Tour". And then another request comes in and doesn't this all fall trippingly into a convenient two week window. And it does.

So, starting September 6 in my own home town of La Crosse WI, with our Storytelling Festival (where I do a little telling and emcee the Friday night spook tales), here's where you'll find me:

September 8-11
Joining Tessa Michaelson Schmidt, Leah Langby, Merri Lindgren, Megan Schliesmann and Sue Abrahamson as mentor/lecturers at the Youth Services Development Institute with 25 youth librarians from around the state to make library magic.

September 12
Storytelling at a celebration for children in childcare in Marshfield

September 13-14
One of the featured tellers at the Chippewa Valley Storytelling Festival (Eau Claire) joining friends and colleagues Kevin McMullin, Tracy Chipman and the Saskill family.

September 17
Doing a three hour workshop on Stealth Programming for the Winnefox Library System .

September 19
Joining many fantastic colleagues and doing a presentation on the how to develop a 1000 Books Before Kindergarten program for multiple southern WI library systems at one of the first - if not the first - of seven workshops statewide to roll out the amazing new Growing WI Readers initiative from DPI.

September 19-22
Chilling out with feminist library colleagues at a four day retreat in Wisconsin's charming Door County. This chance to share discussion, support, great food and friendship is always a highlight!

The finishing touches are being put on the presentations. The GPS is loaded. The powerpoints are on the flash drive. The handouts ready to go. The puppets packed.  See you on the road!

Image courtesy of Pixabay

I Want to Tell You a Story

We have a favorite partnership in our community. It's with our La Crosse Storyelling Festival.  As part of my job, I represent the library on the planning committee for this annual festival, held the first weekend after Labor Day for over 800 avid storytelling fans. The festival features tellers from our local guild, from the state and national tellers.

The library began as a partner years ago by sponsoring children's crafts during breaks in the children's tent storytelling. When I started work at the library four years ago, the fest steering committee asked me to serve on their board - they are all storytelling colleagues that I had known for years in my storytelling circles. Our library wants library staff to serve, on library time, on local organizations and boards (Rotary, Jaycees, Optimists, Earth Day planning committee) so this fit right in with the library goals. And it was storytelling. As a free lance storyteller, it was a great fit!

As a board member, I've been able to work on behalf of the festival - but also on the library's behalf.  I look for ways to make our contribution meaningful and to highlight the library beyond having our logo displayed. The library now co-sponsors the Friday night spooky tales. I host the evening as the "Wizard of Reading" and get to plug the library and reading.  Anyone who shows their library card gets $3 off their admission. The library, pays the difference - we consider it part of our programming.

The Saturday craft area that we sponsor has mellowed into an activity area with one or two book-related activities (bookmark making, writing or drawing activities) and a space for reading and books.  I also do storytelling in the children's tent off and on during the afternoon. It's also a great chance to spend time with folks who are regular library users, chatting about their thoughts on the library;  promote our services to non- and new- users and be there for support of literacy through storytelling.

So the twelve and fourteen hour days I work at the festival are about as fun as they can be for work hours. And the partnership between storytelling and the library...well, it's perfect.

Surefire Storytelling Hits for One World, Many Stories

A comment on my last post asked about ideas for good multicultural stories to use with this year's CLSP (Cooperative Summer Library Program) theme, One World, Many Stories. Here are a few that I love with sources if I could track them back (being a storyteller for twenty-five years has it's drawbacks!). Give them a try.

Anansi and the Moss-Covered Rock (Africa)- Eric Kimmel
Buy a spider glove puppet. Gather your jungle animals and a blanket or rug that is green and mossy looking. You play Anansi/Narrator and tell the story while the kids play the jungle animals part. The rest of the kids chant the magic words, “Isn’t that a strange-looking, moss-covered rock?”.  There are plenty of Anansi stories to share from many folklore collections..I have five or six in my storybag but this remains a favorite.

Wise Monkey Tale (Phillipines) - Guilio Maestro
Using a monkey puppet and other jungle animals, tell the story as Monkey/Narrator with kids as animals. Use a piece of rope in a circle to represent the hole and a construction paper banana leaf. Have the audience chant the banana leaf inscription: “If very wise you wish to be, come on down, wait and see!”

Fat Cat (Norway) - Jack Kent (there is also a version in print from Margaret Read McDonald)
Tie a flat sheet around yourself (or a helpful adult volunteer) like a huge bib. Have the kids play the eatees. As you chomp each one, the kids hide under the sheet. The audience chants “And now I’m going to eat you!”. You can use the same technique for the story of “The Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly”

The Turnip  - (Russian) Traditional
Tie a rope to a door (important note: make it tight!). Have kids play part (use scarves, ears, headbands, masks) and tug rope as you narrate. Audience chants “And they pushed and they pulled and they pulled and they pushed”. When the time comes for the turnips appearance, bring out a turnip from behind a screen.

Bear and the Seven Kids - (Poland)  Traditional 
I've lost the original source beyond hearing it from another storyteller 20 years ago!  However, you can find it as the "Wolf and Seven Kids" and other variants in folktale collections. I use nesting dolls and pretend to forget how many kids are in the story and then reveal them one by one in the intro.  Great audience particiaption tale!

Tiger's Minister (Burma) - Various; teller Janice Harrington has this on CD/tape
A tiger tests a boar, a monkey and a rabbit to determine who should be his new minister by breathing on each one in turn and asking, "Is my breath fair or foul?". Of course it is disguting and the first two animals try truth, than flattery and are eaten. The rabbit claims, with a twitchy nose, that he "can't smell anything one way or the other" and becomes the minister (and ever after rabbits have twitched their noses and now you know why!)

Roly Poly Rice Ball - (Japan) - Margaret Read McDonald's Twenty Tellable Tales
Crab Eyes - (Caribbean) - Margaret Read McDonald's Twenty Tellable Tales
Just a pleasure to tell straight without props. McDonald does a masterful job at breaking down the telling and adding emphasis to help even novice tellers deliver the story like a pro!

The Mosquito (unsure of country of origin) - Anne Pellowski's The Story Vine
Anne Pellowski's books are chockfull of great stories from many cultures perfect for storytelling. This string story has excellent instructions/illustrations and is worth the time it takes to learn. This is perfect for school visits and produces "big-eyed" results each time for all ages!

I also have used Once Upon a Hodja (long out of print, that has some good Middle Eastern Nasrudin stories (in turns wise, foolish, a trickster and a storyteller) and Caroline Peterson books for additional ideas.

What other good stories do you have?


Illustration from 2011 CLSP Manual. Images are copyrighted. Contact the CSLP for more information

Using Storytelling with Small Groups

I did a storytelling workshop this week on the "One World, Many Stories" SLP theme with librarians from five systems in the southern part of the state.  I wanted to give everyone tips on finding sources for stories, tips on telling and some "can't miss" stories from a few different countries to put in their story bags.

One of the participants blogged later that that while there was good information on handling a beaucoup big crowd, it wasn't very "real-world" helpful for librarians who work with small numbers of kids in storytime - ten or less; or more typically three to five kids, who can be very passive without a crowd to rev them up.  So right!  I skipped that part completely!  So, as a  mea culpa, here are a few tips I use that help when bringing storytelling into storytimes with teeny crowds!

I make it a point in my storytimes to tell a story each and every week.  I believe strongly that kids need more than books and props to excite their imagination.  Stories help them picture the tale on their own.  Magic happens with the use of storytelling no matter how large or how small the crowd. In my years of storytimes, I have kept this practice up whether I have two kids or thirty two and it has always worked.

Although I have some large-cover-your-whole-arm puppets, I don't use these in the intimate atmosphere of storytimes.  I usually tell my stories without puppets or props, letting the magic of the words and the plot carry the tale. That being said, I am also one to make a splash before the story is started to get the kids excited about a form of listening that many of them don't have alot of experience with!

My favorite intro is to put a small prop or puppet that relates to the story inside a bag that I bring out when it is time to tell the story. I reach inside the bag, feel around, do some "oohing" and "aahing" and "Hmmm, what could this be?" before I bring out the prop. This little teasing part gets the kids focused on the what is inside the bag and gets them excited. When the prop comes out, I say, "That reminds me of our story today" and off we go.

Other times I will bring along a finger puppet or two or three to small storytimes and let the kids play with them before or after the story to reinforce the story...or to let the kids engage in story play and re-imagining or telling the story themselves.  When kids are too shy or the group too small to even have them engage in that much play I do a few little retellings of scenes with the puppets and hope that the next week brings more participation.

Small group storytelling can be some of the most rewarding because the stories shared can be quieter and more focused.  Any other tips out there on sharing storytelling with small groups?

Image: 'Day 138' http://www.flickr.com/photos/38451115@N04/4218226857

Happy Birthday to the Good Doctor

Here comes Dr. Seuss' birthday and easy programming fun! Today we had our annual party and a good time was had by all. I'd like to share some of what we did as well as some of our best tips from other years. A big tip of the hat goes to all my colleagues who have contributed so many great ideas at the PUBYAC listserv over the years.

Stories
My best short and great Seuss stories to share with a mixed age group:

• "What Was I Scared of" from "The Sneetches" (Dr. Seuss' one and only scary story!)
• "Too Many Daves" from the same book (we make name cards of all the silly names and as we tell the story we hand them out to delighted audience members)
• "I Wish That I Had Duck Feet" from the easy reader (we made up props and invite kids to come up from the audience to wear one each as the boy imagines what amazing things he could do with various animal parts).
• And if you want to share a longer story, tell a quick synopsis of most of it and only read a few pages of text to keep kid interest high.

Stretch - The Dr. Seuss-y
Make a bunch of paper red fish and paper blue fish and hand one of each to all the kids. Then sing to the tune of the Hokey Pokey:
You put your one fish in, you put your one fish out
You put your one fish in and you shake it all about,
You do the Dr. Seuss-y and you turn yourself around, that's what it's all about!

Repeat with two fish; red fish and blue fish. And the kids have a nifty fish bookmark as a keepsake.

Activities (a small selection of favorites)

• Pin the Tale on the Cat in the Hat
• Edible Dr. Seuss hats (Nilla wafers; white frosting and red gummy lifesavers make the coolest hat!)
• Non-edible Dr. Seuss Hats - lots of great designs on the net
• Searches - my favorite is part of ALSC's "So Much to See, So Much to Do" marketing toolkit and can be found here
• Sign a Birthday Card for Dr. Seuss - kids sign it and we display it during the month

Cake
A birthday cake to share is always a highlight of this party!

Goodbye
Send kids out with a star sticker on their bellies.

This year I especially enjoyed the energy of local college students who duded themselves up as Daisy-Headed Mayzie; Thing One and Thing Two and the Cat in the Hat and decorated up our program room in a truly festive way. They had a drawing for a Dr Seuss book; a fish pond with Dr. Seuss prizes and made bookmarks with the kids. It was a great partnership!

What ideas have you found successful for your party day?