STORYTELLING with young children in EFL

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STORYTELLING with young children in EFL

• Sophie Ioannou-Georgiou
• sophiecy_at_yahoo.com

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Why stories?

• Stories are
• motivating for children.
• Interesting and enjoyable.
• a rich source of language and experiences.
• a source of natural, authentic language
• Stories offer
• a connection to the childrens life and interests
• language in meaningful contexts
• multiple possibilities for activities involving
  multimodality
• Insights into the culture of the author/s
• a structure/plot that can be followed and often a
  natural repetition
• of vocabulary and structures.
• opportunities for developing reading/listening
  skills
• a way to develop childrens attention spans
• a way to develop a lifelong love for reading and
  books

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So children

• want to listen (motivation)
• listen with a purpose and become involved in
  meaningful communication)
• develop learning strategies (not all is
  understandable, searching for meaning, predicting
  and guessing strategies).
• become aware of the general feel and sound of
  the L2.
• develop general learning (issues/topics linked to
  other curriculum subjects), cognitive skills and
  creative thinking

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How to choose a story

• A story should always be suitable to the
  interests and developmental level of the child.
• For younger learners a story should have
• a clear storyline
• plenty of repetition
• helpful illustrations
• opportunities for joining in
• at a level where children can understand most of
  it (with appropriate help)
• linked with a topic you are working on
  (curriculum)

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How to choose a story

• For older learners, a story should be
• at an appropriate language level
• related to the students interests and age
• when possible linked to other topics/subjects of
  the curriculum
• either offer subject content, or
• be suitable as a springboard for subject-content
  work

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How to tell a story

• Decide if you will tell or read the story.
• Decide if you will modify the language and how
• Prepare
• Act out the story
• Find opportunities for students to join in

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Storytelling a process

• Usually there are 3 stages in storytelling
• Pre-storytelling stage
• (to prepare the students to follow the story)
• While-storytelling stage
• (to engage students in the storytelling process)
• After storytelling stage
• (expanding the story to further creative
  activities, consolidating/evaluating
  understanding)

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Some ideas for pre-storytelling activities

• Pre-storytelling for younger learners
• Pre-teach key vocabulary
• Use a song connected with the theme
• Introduce and talk about the main characters
• Pre-storytelling for older learners
• Give words or phrases from the story for children
  to guess what it is about
• Show pictures from the story and have students
  guess what the story is about
• Give title and students guess story
• Give part of the story and students predict the
  story
• Give gapped summary ands students have to create
  the story

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Some ideas for while-storytelling activities

• While-storytelling for younger learners
• students hold up pictures of objects or
  characters when these are mentioned in the story
• join in the story
• asked to guess what comes next
• sequence pictures
• While-storytelling for older learners
• hold up words when these are mentioned
• sequence sentences
• joining in the story
• predicting whats to follow
• taking notes

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Some ideas for after-storytelling activities

• After-storytelling for younger learners
• draw a picture of a favourite scene
• make a class book of the story
• act out the story
• learn the story in the form of a chant
• After-storytelling for older learners
• Make their own story
• Create their own ending or make other changes to
  the story
• Complete worksheets about the story
• Create posters about the story
• Put a class play about the story
• Carry out an investigation into similar stories/
  the characters or countries in the story / etc