Dr Eric Miller (PhD in Folklore),

Director, World Storytelling Institute and Chennai Storytelling Festival

www.storytellinginstitute.org

September 2015

Handout for: Workshop on

"Using Storytelling to Teach Any Subject"
Workshop Participants could include: Teachers (in schools); Lecturers, Professors, etc
(in colleges and universities); Instructors and Trainers; and Parents.
Workshop Objectives: Assist participants
1) To use storytelling to teach any subject.
2) To improve their own storytelling.
3) To prepare to coach students to find/shape/create and tell stories.
This Handout consists of A) Summary of Workshop Activities (pages 1-2), and
B) Information about Storytelling (pages 3-4).

A) Summary of Workshop Activities

1) Briefly go over B) Information about Storytelling (pages 3-4).
2) Warm-up Activity #1: Stories about something that happened. (Told in pairs.)
Participants are invited to tell about something that happened in the last 24 hours.
Then, volunteers could tell to the entire group,
a) The story one told to one's partner ("I did ...").
(Gives practice speaking to a large group.)
b) The story one told to one's partner -- as if it had happened to an external character
("He/she did ...").
(Distances oneself from the material, giving one a different perspective on what occurred.)
c) The story one heard from one's partner ("He/she did ...").
(Tests one's listening abilities.)
d) The story one heard from one's partner, as if it had happened to oneself ("I did ...").
(Places one in someone else's position, giving one a different perspective on what occurred.)
3) Warm-up Activity #2: Stories about overcoming challenges. (Told in pairs.)
Tell about a character you admire very much. This could be any character -- a historical
figure, someone in one's family, a character in a movie, TV show, or novel, etc. It could even
be a character one makes up.
What does this character want to do? Tell about a challenge this character faced.
Did she want to go someplace? Do something? Make something? Invent something?
Discover something? Solve some problem? Escape from somewhere? Go somewhere?
Give background and context: Had other people tried to face this challenge in the
past and failed? Why was the challenge important? Why and how was it difficult? What
social conditions had come up that made this challenge important and difficult? What was at
stake? -- for the character and/or for others. What good things might happen if the challenge
was overcome? What negative things might happen if the challenge was not overcome?
Option: Stop before you tell if and how the character overcame the challenge. Once you have
created a clear picture of the challenge, stop and ask your partner: "How would you have tried
to overcome the challenge? What would you have done in this situation? How might you
have prepared to face this challenge? Might you have tried to get additional training? Might
you have tried to get help from friends? What strategy do you suggest for overcoming this
challenge?" Give your partner some opportunity to answer these questions. Then, tell your
partner how your character actually did overcome the challenge.

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4) Primary Activity: Stories that Teach any academic subject. (Told in groups of 3, 4,
or 5.)
Sample Stories:
"Walter, the Drop of Water" ( www.storytellinginstitute.org/347.pdf ) -- Chemistry.
"King Ya-ya" ( www.storytellinginstitute.org/343.pdf ) -- Environmental Studies.
"Lost in a Forest of Words" ( www.storytellinginstitute.org/342.pdf ) -- English Language.
"The Bear on the Mountainside" ( www.storytellinginstitute.org/335.pdf ) -- Morality, ethics.
Stories can help learners visualise phenomena, and understand situations clearly and vividly.
Stories can be fun, and can help learners get emotionally-involved.
Participants might be asked,
a) "What subject to you teach?" "In what academic discipline are you in?"
b) "Please select one lesson you have taught students, or might like to teach students".
c) (To use the terminology of a Lesson Plan) "What is the objective of the lesson? What
should the students learn? What facts do you want them to absorb? What principles do you
want them to become familiar with, and be able to apply?" The lesson involves something one
wants one's students to think about -- to understand, and to understand the importance of.
Educators often say: "We do not want to teach students what to think. We want to teach them
how to think. A saying that illustrates this point is: "If you give someone a vegetable, they can
eat once. If you teach someone how to grow a vegetable (and help them to obtain the needed
farm equipment) -- they can eat during their entire lifetimes." Stories can teach what and how.
Sometimes when one wants students to think about and learn something, they are not paying
attention. They are not absorbing it. Not retaining it. Not interested in it. In such cases, one
needs to capture their imaginations.
The "teaching-by-storytelling method" often involves personifying aspects of the matter,
personifying abstractions into characters. These characters might be in situations in which
they might need to decide what to do next. The characters might want things, have goals,
missions. The characters might have adventures.
So, seek to find or create characters, and a story, that embody elements of the lesson.
Present characters that learners can relate to. The learners should be able to understand
these characters' points of view -- including what the characters want, and why they want it.
Why use metaphors? Possible answers include: To present a situation clearly and vividly,
and to connect a new situation with previously-known situations.
Options: Have one character do something a wrong way, and one character do it a right way.
Or, have a character do something a wrong way first, and then a right way.
Options: Present a debate between characters. Present a debate within a person (between
voices/urges/ideas within a single character).
Regarding subjects such as History, Social Studies, Anthropology, and Sociology -This material should not be presented just in terms of dates, places, and statistics.
That is too dry. We need to make it juicy. What was the struggle involved -- within a
person, or between people? What was at stake for the participants? Why did the
participants want some things to happen, and want other things not to happen?
Case studies can be presented and discussed. One can paint a picture. Students
can imagine themselves in the position of the historical figure. Explain the challenges
this character faced, and ask: "If you were in that situation, what might you have
done? How might you have tried to overcome the challenges and solve the problem?"
This might involve: Decision-making. Problem-solving. Finding solutions. Being
clever. Being ingenious. Working hard, and also working smart.
Regarding subjects such as Math, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and Engineering --

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To teach abstractions such as mathematical procedures, concepts, and formulas -give Examples learners can visualise, and project themselves into.
For ex: There are 4 children, and 8 apples. How many apples could each child have?
Regarding Inventions and Discoveries: Set the scene -- What were the social conditions?
How did the need arise for an Invention or Discovery? How was the need addressed? What
were some of the obstacles and frustrations along the way? Story characters might involve
1) aspects of the inventor's life story, or 2) elements with which the inventor was working.
___________________________________________________________________________

B) Information about Storytelling

Two aspects of Storytelling work
1) Analysing, shaping, and creating stories (Content).
2) Coaching Communication Skills. Storytelling is a form of Public Speaking involving Acting.
Basic Guidelines for Storytelling
1) Visualise. 2) Describe. 3) Mime (relating to objects, etc). 4) Become characters.
Three Types of Stories
1) Personal-Experience stories (Autobiographical stories), and other Documentary stories.
2) Traditional stories (Folklore, etc).
3) Made-up stories.
Types of Traditional Stories include Animal Fables, Fairytales, Epics, Legends, and Myths.
Twelve Elements of Story
1) The Title of the story.
2) Characters (their histories, thoughts, decisions, follow-through on decisions, actions, etc).
3) Characters' Ways of speaking.
4) Characters' Ways of moving.
5) Place.
6) Time (continuous, or jumps, flashbacks?).
7) The Storyline (also known as, plot) -- in one or two sentences.
8) Objects in the story.
9) Sensory Elements in the story: Smells, Flavours, Colours, Textures, etc.
10) Emotions in the story (for the characters, the teller, and the listeners).
11) If the story is being told by a character in the story:
Who is the Narrator? What is his/her Point of View, Tone of Voice, Attitude, Style?
Elements 1-11 combine to produce -12) Point (Theme, Meaning, Moral, Message, Lesson, Take-away).
Regardless of whether a story's characters are humans, animals, divinities, etc -- all stories
are about situations. Story listeners can Project themselves into, and Imagine themselves in
these situations. They may Empathise and identify with -- and even possibly Imitate -- these
characters. Considering if they might do things the same as, or differently from, how the
characters do things gives the listeners practice for living.
Identify a story's Turning Points, Defining Moments, Dramatic Moments, Moments of
Decision, Moments of Truth, Pivotal Points, Crucial Scenes, Key Scenes, etc.
Theories of Story (Models, Formulas, Structures)
1) Vladimir Propp: Wholeness, Fragmentation, and Reformation.
2) Joseph Campbell: Oppression, Escape, Connection with Nature, and Triumphant Return.
3) Carl Jung: Integration of story elements, and Individuation (maturity) of tellers and listeners.
4) The Well-made Play: Centering around Conflict.
5) Characters are on a Mission, and Want Something.
6) Catharsis: Great Characters Rise, and Fall (due to Pride).
7) Classical Indian Aesthetics: 9 Rasas (inspired in audience members by performers):
Heroism, Laughter, Disgust, Anger, Love, Sadness, Fear, Surprise, and Peace.

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Suggestions for Storytelling (These can also be Criteria for Assessing Storytelling)
1) Throw yourself into telling the story. Believe in the value of the story, and be enthusiastic about sharing it. Commit to the story, trust it, get into it, and tell it whole-heartedly.
2) Use voice modulation. Vary tone-of-voice, attitude, and emotion; and speed, pitch, and
rhythm. Give contrast -- even opposites (slow/fast, continuously/with-pauses, soft-loud,
low-pitch/high-pitch, meek/proud, etc). Add rhythm. Both as the narrator, and as characters.
3) Use facial expressions, gestures, body language (posture and movement). Add rhythm.
Both as the narrator, and as characters.
4) Visualise elements of each scene, and describe these elements to listeners.
5) Act-out (step-into, role-play) characters: speak their words and physically become them.
6) Make eye-contact with individual listeners. Try looking at a single listener while
speaking a complete thought. Both as the narrator, and as characters.
7) Develop repeated conversational exchanges between characters in the story.
8) Sing songs (or use other verbal delivery styles). Songs could be sung by A) the narrator,
about something or someone in the story; or B) by a character, about something that she is
thinking -- I want to do this..., I feel like this..., This is what I did..., etc.
Stylised Tone of Voice vs A Natural and Direct Tone of Voice
When telling a story, be aware of using any Stylised/Special/Artificial tone of voice.
Such tones of voice can create a distance between you and your listeners.
When telling a story, be aware of the inclination to sell a story, to constantly be
insisting that it is important. An ideal is for listeners to be attracted to the story world, and
to seek to inhabit the world the storyteller is conjuring. Sometimes go slowly.
Dramatic Tension. In story, as in life, each action causes a reaction, and has consequences.
Suspense: When and how might anticipated consequences occur?
Use Metaphors in speech, and in story. What are some uses and values of metaphors?
Options: 1) Tell an entire story, and discuss it afterwards. Or, 2) Stop in the course of a story,
and discuss aspects of it along the way.
After Telling a Story
Ask "Open Questions" (questions with no right or wrong answers), such as,
1) Tell one specific thing -- an image, an action by a character, etc -- you liked about the story,
or about the way the story was told.
2) Tell one thing you did not like about the story. Might you like to add to the story, or change
it in any other way? Suggestions for improvement regarding how the story was told?
3) Might the story remind you of any personal experience, or of some other story?
4) Does the story teach any lessons?
With each question, the teller might first seek to get responses from her listeners, and then
give her own answer.
Links
Animal fables and fairy tales, www.storytellinginstitute.org/87.html .
Ponnivala Story (Annanmar Kathai). Researched by Dr Brenda Beck, Toronto.
www.ponnivala.com , http://legendofponnivala.blogspot.in .
Links to articles providing evidence that storytelling activities tend to help students improve their
general academic abilities, www.storytellinginstitute.org/37.html .
"Ways Storytelling Can Be Used for Teaching and Learning" by Eric Miller,
www.storytellinginstitute.org/2015e.pdf .
"Ways Verbal Play such as Storytelling and Word-games Can Be Used for Teaching-and-learning
Languages" by Eric Miller, www.storytellinginstitute.org/2015a.pdf .