Storytelling with year 3
Year 3 children love to be told stories. And it doesn't matter if they don't know all of the words. Challenge them by telling a story that they can't help being curious about. Tell the story more than once until they are confident that they understand all of it.
Tell some kind of story at the start of every lesson. Even if it is a very short one. The children will come to expect it and look forward to it. If you do it properly, they will settle down and be quiet. And it will be an excellent preparation for any topic, any skill.
1. Retell stories, and change something - see if the children can notice the change.
2. Use different media as you tell the same story several times -
Tell some kind of story at the start of every lesson. Even if it is a very short one. The children will come to expect it and look forward to it. If you do it properly, they will settle down and be quiet. And it will be an excellent preparation for any topic, any skill.
- Don't only tell stories on 'Listening and Speaking' days, or 'Language Arts' days.
- Don't limit your stories to what is in the text book.
1. Retell stories, and change something - see if the children can notice the change.
2. Use different media as you tell the same story several times -
- tell the story with actions and voices
- use puppets on sticks, or finger puppets, or mouth puppets
- tell the story with pictures
- use an LCD to show pictures
- include some chants or rhymes for the children to join in with.
- choose several children to take on character parts and act/speak during the story
What stories should you tell?
Any stories. Really!
It's just important to tell stories. Why?
Many children live in a very small, limited world. They may or may not have access to many books, or TV shows, or Internet.
Just to mention a few reasons. And storytelling is how this happens. And if they don't get stories from you, they will probably as they get older find them from a less desirable source.
- traditional stories,
- modern stories,
- made up stories,
- fantasy,
- true stories about your childhood,
- stories about the children in the class
- stories about animals - real or imaginary
It's just important to tell stories. Why?
- For one thing, it will help to improve their language skills.
- For another thing it helps them to develop the way children should.
Many children live in a very small, limited world. They may or may not have access to many books, or TV shows, or Internet.
- They not only need to know about the outside world, they need to be able to dream about their future and what they could become.
- They need to understand the emotions that are burbling around inside them.
- They need to know that there are others in the world who feel or experience the same as them, and differently from them.
Just to mention a few reasons. And storytelling is how this happens. And if they don't get stories from you, they will probably as they get older find them from a less desirable source.
Their own stories
Teachers can get very bound up in their own world of trying to get children to write correctly, and not give children opportunity to express stories of their own making. They have stories that need to be imagined, and told, and hopefully written as well.
Look at the Creative Writing page for some ideas about this.
Look at the Creative Writing page for some ideas about this.