Storytelling

Why should we use storytelling in the classroom? Many think that 'storytelling' is an 'art' and many of us know someone who is fantastic at telling stories, but everyone of us can tell a story, and we do, all the time. Everyday over coffee or when we get home to our family, we re-tell interesting events from our day or something that we heard on the radio or TV. Stories are linguistically rich and can be a good source of new language, but also contain everything we need for an enjoyable learning experience. They are also extremely flexible, stories can be used with children, teenagers and adults and level of English can range from beginners to proficiency.

How to tell a story? Storytelling does not need to be about the teacher reading a story outloud; the learners can do it too - to the whole class or in small groups or pairs. It does not have to be about the learners reading aloud either - reading silently is the way we usually read in our native language, after all. Whichever way you actually use the story, there is plenty to do around it to help the learning process.

The video workshop above, examines how storytelling can be used in the classroom with a variety of learners, including a number of practical tips and examples that you can use with your own learners.

You can download all the materials from the workshop in the downloads section on the right. You can complete some of the materials online by taking a look at the activities in the activities section, and if you have any questions or comments about the workshop we would be happy to hear from you. You can add your comments in the discuss section. We hope you enjoy the workshop.