Homeschool Tips Tricks Ideas

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How to Tell a Story?

One of the most searched-for communication skills on the Internet is “how to tell a story.” I would like to give you a quick step-by-step guide to this process of story telling, drawn from my 23 years of being a professional storyteller. This is the fast and quick method to learn a new story.

1. Decide on a story. Sounds elementary, but at some point, you need to find a story that you love. If you are having problems, search the Internet for some simple Aesop fables or find some good stories at a site like Storyteller.net .

2. Break the story down into an outline of events so that you can remember the episodes of each story.

You have two choices for step three. Do one or both if you would like.

3A. Write out or draw out the parts of the story. Using longhand, that means pencil and paper, write out the episodes of the story in your own words. Do not copy the story. Rewrite it in your own words. Doing this process by hand allows your brain to overcome any resistance you might have to the story. Knowing you can do this process with your story is also a way for your brain to overcome some fear of public speaking that might hinder you from telling this story.

3B. The other way to break down a story is via “storyboarding,” a technique that many storytellers use. Take a letter-sized piece of paper. Fold it in half along the length. You now have an eleven inch piece of pager that looks like a taco. Then, fold the right side up against the left and then fold the same way again. When you unfold the paper you will have a piece of paper divided into 8 segments.

Starting at the top segment, draw out each step of the story. This is only for you to learn so stick figures and bad drawings are just fine. This visual method may help you grasp the story better than writing alone.

4. Begin to tell yourself the story, aloud, using your own words while looking at one of the #3 tools above. Repeat this process several times.

5. Think about the story you are telling. Are there parts of the story that do not really need to be there? Do they drag down the story? Cross them off the list or the storyboard and tell yourself the story one more time with those parts of the story removed. Again, at each of these times, you are speaking your story aloud. Let your face get a feel for the story.

6. Put your notes down and tell yourself the story a few more times. This is a great exercise to do while you are driving your car or cleaning your house. Just keep talking to yourself.

7. Call up a friend or find an associate and tell them your story. Use no notes or storyboard. When you finish telling the story to your associate, ask them if it makes sense to them. Did they think you left out any parts? This is not the time to see if they “get it” or understand the deep meanings. You just want to know if the essential delivery of the story makes sense.

8. As your confidence in the story grows, you will want to start thinking about the emotions represented by different words in the story. You may find that you wish to emphasize one part or character over another. These things come with time. If you feel better about saying “once upon a time” at the beginning or “the end” as one of your story endings, then do so. As you grow to understand storytelling even more, you will learn so many other ways to start or end a story.

9. When it is time for your story’s debut, be confident. Look at your audience. Speak clearly. Slow down and enjoy the story experience. As a professional storyteller, I can tell you that it takes a dozen or more tellings of a story to find the your true rhythm and delivery for each story.

There you have it, how to tell a great story! This is a quick, get-it-now guide to storytelling. There is so much more you can learn about how to tell a story. Remember- get started today telling stories. Like a painter who must paint often to get better at painting, you, too, must speak stories often and to many groups in order to improve.

Some resources:
To get my free ECourse on storytelling, see the front page of my website at www.seantells.net. For hundreds of articles and stories, please visit www.storyteller.net. To order the EWorkbook on storytelling that includes live coaching and audio files, please visit www.storytelling101.com

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Based in Arizona, Sean Buvala is a full-time professional storyteller and storytelling consultant who works throughout North America teaching storytelling for business. Along with storytelling techniques for corporate communication, Sean is also sought after for teaching storytelling for schools and homeschool groups. For more information about Sean’s work as a storytelling coach, please see his site at http://www.seantells.net

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Ruth Stotter’s book, Smiles! 101 Stunts, Oohs and Aahs, Puzzles and Magic to Bring a Smile to a Child’s Face, is like a small “dictionary” of fun, easy games and time fillers that’s great to have in your briefcase or backpack when working with homeschool co-ops, groups or even your own children. Especially good for those who are just starting in forms of activities with children, Ruth has managed to incorporate a wide variety of both active and thinking games. If you are an experienced recreation leader, teacher or parent, you’ll find this book is a nice go-to guide to remind you of games and activities you once knew but might have pushed to the back of your brain. I found myself saying, “Oh, yeah, I’ve done that one and the kids loved it” several times. I can imagine, too, that older children might have a good time using this book to plan a program for younger siblings. That would be, for example, a perfect 7th grade homeschool project teaching responsibility, organization and creativity Overall a nice resource book to have at your fingertips when working with the grade-school-aged crowd. -Storyteller.net Reviews

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by Michelle B.

Reading is probably the most important academic skill to teach our homeschool children. Once they have the ability to read and understand what they are reading, they will be able to use that skill not just to complete assignments but to explore the world through print, satisfy their curiosity and expand upon their learning.

How do I begin to teach my preschool or kindergarten child the importance of reading?

Here are a few homeschool reading tips to help encourage our students to embrace the skill of reading, regardless of the style of homeschooling one chooses. Begin with these well before your kids can read, and make them a part of your regular routine.

*To understand the value of reading our children need to see the important people in their lives using the tool of reading on a regular basis. Do your kids see you read? We have many opportunities to read each day: recipes for dinner, shopping lists, weather and news reports in the paper or online, email, game instructions, newsletters, appliance manuals, posters, street signs, even the cereal box! Read for pleasure, such as the comics, a novel or book of short stories, blogs, websites, poetry. The more your child sees you in the act of reading, whether you are reading aloud or to yourself, the more the act of reading becomes an expected part of life.

*Print should be readily available for the kids to see and touch and explore. Children’s picture books, books with only print, magazines, newspapers, how-to books, ABC books, computer print-outs, coffee-table books, workbooks, textbooks, letters, notes, signs, lists of words, etc. Try hanging a small dry-erase board at child level, maybe on their bedroom door, and write a new note everyday. You can write the names of items in your family room or schoolroom on index cards and attach them to the respective piece, such as “chair,” “computer,” or “cabinet.” Print a short note or a joke on a piece of paper and leave it at their lunch or dinner plate. Find a real mailbox or make one and take turns leaving letters or notes to each other. Let your kids play a computer game that involves some reading.

*Writing materials should also be available. Set up a writing space for your family that your homeschool students can use whenever they would like to. It can be a corner of the room with a small table or a desk, a reading lamp, shelves of various papers and notepads, a box holding markers, pens and pencils, even a typewriter. Or simply fill a basket with notepads and pens that can be carried to the desired space. Keep refilling the supplies with whatever you find, such as envelopes, stamps, order forms, shopping list pads, index cards, etc. And of course there are the famous magnetic ABC’s for your fridge!

*The library needs to be a regular destination for the family, such as every week or two. Each family member needs their own library card and to be taught how to use it. Every library system has its own age requirements, so find out what yours is and obtain those cards as soon as you can. Have your children choose their own books to check out on each library trip. Establish a system for your family that includes a special place, such as a shelf or basket, to keep those books separate from your own, and a place to keep track of the books to be returned. My family parks books we are done with in a square basket on the work table to keep them together until the next library outing.

*Children should have a shelf of their own to hold their special books. Many homeschool groups use book clubs, such as Scholastic, to provide their members access to inexpensive books. Thrift shops, discount stores, bargain shelves in the big bookstores, and library book sales are also good sources of inexpensive books. For example, we make good use of the discard shelf at our library.

*Read together. Read aloud to your children everyday. Look up an informational website together. Pretend you are toy shopping: read the toy catalog and write wish lists. Read a recipe book with your child and choose a dish to make.

The more that reading happens in your house, the more it becomes an ordinary part of life, and your kids will begin to see reading as an essential skill that hopefully they will want to be able to do themselves.

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The Author, Michelle B., is a full-time homeschooling mother of four who, as of this writing, has been homeschooling for 18 years. She is a former elementary school teacher in the private-school system.

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