Storytelling in the Classroom

Storytelling can be a powerful tool in the classroom. It is often helpful to begin with the teacher playing the role of storyteller or by inviting a professional storyteller into the classroom. But it is when the students become the storytellers that storytelling makes its greatest contribution to the classroom.

Listening to stories as they are told by another:

• develops listening skills

• increases concentration

• develops vocabulary

• develops a sense of story

• motivates students to read

Learning to tell stories to others:

• improves oral language skills

• improves story writing

• develops the students’ understanding of plot and sequence

• encourages reading and critical thinking skills

Integrate storytelling into other subject areas across the curriculum.
While language arts and the creative arts are obvious areas, stories can help us to understand other cultures and other times. They can easily be integrated into history, geography and social studies programs. Carefully chosen stories can even be integrated into the mathematics programs.

Storytelling can be a powerful tool for recognizing and validating the cultures of immigrant students.