writing workshop

Living Like Writers: Storytelling.

Ruth Ayres

Stacey and I decided to use Fridays throughout the summer to share inspiration for living like writers.  Since storytelling is on my mind (and many of yours — thanks for the comments!), I thought I’d offer this challenge:

Tell a story this weekend.  While you’re at it, why not tell it a couple of different times and watch the way it evolves with each telling?

Here are some websites that offer tips and inspiration.  Eventually I’m planning to take some of these and create “sidebars” that could go on a parent newsletter to encourage storytelling at home.

  • This Ordinary Day — One of my current favorites in the blog-world.  I love how they take everyday life and find meaning.
  • Story Corps — I found this website many years ago & have probably linked it here before.   The mission of Story Corps is to:  “honor and celebrate one another’s lives through listening.”  You can listen to conversations between two people who are important to each other and hear the stories which connect them.  Get a box of tissues, a cold drink, and settle in for a treat — you will certainly be inspired to tell your own story after listening to a few of these.  Once you are inspired, grab a special person in your life and record your own story with Story Corps.
  • Story Arts — I stumbled across this in a google search.  It is geared toward teachers and is chock full of ideas.  There is also a newsletter with “thoughts and ideas about the art of telling tales.”  You will find the link to sign up for Musings when you follow the Story Arts link.
  • The Storytelling Center Inc. of New York City — A list of tips for beginning storytellers.

We’d love to hear how your foray into storytelling goes this weekend.  Please check back and leave a comment.

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Published by Ruth Ayres

Unhurried. Finding the magic in the middle of living. Capturing a life of ridiculous grace + raw stories.

9 thoughts on “Living Like Writers: Storytelling.”

  1. cool game, dayle. tfs. 🙂

    lynelle — great question . . . i’ll post a response later this week.

    fer — i’m glad they are useful to you. lmk if you find more!

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  2. Bonnie —
    Hooray for digital storytelling & THANK YOU for reminding us of it in this post. Yes, it counts! I believe it is a valuable way to document the stories of our lives. Now if I were just better at it — I’m in the midst of the learning curve. I know you have a wealth of information and experience in it. “What do I know?” I know it’s powerful and that I have a lot to learn. Sounds like the perfect weekend challenge. 🙂
    Thanks for your feedback!
    Ruth

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  3. Mrs. V —
    I think it was a wise choice to tell a Dora & Boots story. When I asked my three year old son to tell me a story it was about Thomas the train. As he was telling his story, I realized that by giving our young writers the freedom to use characters that already exist, we allow them the opportunity to focus on storytelling skills (like plot and suspense; problem & solution). It reinforces my belief that in our primary grades most of the stories told/written should be grounded in experience.

    And kudos to your mom for taking the time to share stories of her youth with you. That was my take on this weekend’s challenge — I told a story from when I went to camp, being intentional about telling it well as a storyteller.

    Thanks for your feedback!

    Ruth

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  4. In your role as teacher and literary specialists how do you explain to SPED teachers and other specialists the importance of following the idea you are teaching and not teaching another method. For example, our district uses Fountas and Pinnell and the Comprehension Toolkit as their tools for teachers to use. It’s not that you only are allowed to use this, but the specialists are teaching our at risk readers another “tool” so to speak during their 45 minute lab time instead of reinforcing the strategies in the classroom. I guess what I am asking is how do we begin to impact the importance of all teachers to promote life long readers regardless of ability level? I am starting a Professional Learning Community this upcoming school year and I am afraid my approach may be to in your face. In a nut shell I am using Dr. Allington’s theory of consistency. I would just like some of your thoughts as my co presenter and I develop the agenda for our first meeting in a few weeks.

    Thank you so much!

    Lynnelle

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  6. I tried out the storytelling a little bit this weekend with my three year old. She requested the story involve Dora though. At first I thought making up a story with Dora was not really what you had in mind when you mentioned the challenge, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that even a silly Dora story can evolve and improve with multiple retellings. I did the story of Dora and Boots and getting to where they needed to meet their new friend (my daughter). Of course they had to consult the map and have some adventures along the way. When I was finished my daughter wanted to tell her own Dora story. Even experiences like this that I initially did not think would be that important will be anecdotes that I can share with my students and that will foster my daughter’s storytelling skills.

    When I was younger my mom used to always tell us about adventures with her siblings growing up. I didn’t think about it until just now, but that is probably a huge piece of my writer’s autobiography that it never occurred to me to include all the different times I had that assignment.

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  9. I am reading Elizabeth Edwards’ Resilience. In it she shares a game she and her husband used to play in the car when they were travelling with their kids. Each person had a turn. As they passed houses the person had to choose a house to tell a story about. They had the time that they passed in front of the house to gather as many details as they could and then they had to tell the story to the family. How cool is that?!

    Go ahead and write that list of suggestions for parents because I would love to use it in my newsletters next year!

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