It has been argued that many western cultures have almost lost the art of storytelling but we all live our lives by storying. This chapter, co-authored by Victoria Campbell, University of Sydney, looks at how oral storying is critical for developing a child's sense of self and identity, and how oral storying can facilitate the writing process.
Anticipated outcomes for the chapter
After working through this chapter, you should be able to:
• articulate why storying and storytelling are important in the lives of young children
• acknowledge the importance of being able to tell stories in your role as a teacher
• understand the relationship between telling stories, drawing and emerging as a writer.
If you don't know the trees
you may get lost in the forest
If you don't know the stories
you may get lost in life. (Agard, 2014, p. 11)
SCENARIO: JORDY
In earlier chapters we have seen how from birth the young child is on a lifelong journey to make sense of who they are in the world. By around three years old, many children are becoming confident storytellers, especially when sharing stories with their loved ones. Consider two-and-a-half-year-old Jordy's story below:
Once upon a time a shark with very large teeth comes out of the leaves and ROARED! The shark was SCARY and he scared Manon and he bit Manon. Poor Manon!! He climbed up a cliff to get away from the shark.
‘ROAR!’ Manon and his baby went to a different country and they were safe.
Jordy had been watching a film for the first time, but he used his own understandings to make sense of some of the characters and the context as he retold it to his grandmother. Can you guess what story inspired Jordy's? What conventions has he incorporated in this story? After listening to his story, Jordy's grandmother responded by writing it down as Jordy retold it. She used capitals to represent the emotion that Jordy had used in the retelling. Because she had not seen the film that Jordy had been watching, she had no context and was a little unsure of how a shark could emerge from a clump of trees and roar; nor what kind of creature ‘Manon’ was. Nevertheless she was impressed that he was already demonstrating an understanding of narrative form.
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