Category: Storytelling

Storytellers work from the edge. While words may be chosen and time spent preparing for telling, in the end the storyteller must step to the “story edge ”  and cast the net of words out over that edge allowing them to fall where they may. At the place where words are spoken… there begins and ends any say about what happens next, for the distance those words need to travel to secure a place in your audience’s heart and mind may be as close as they are to you in the room or as far away as they are in their mind somewhere else at the time of telling. Inevitably, working from the edge, the storyteller armed with good intention, must relinquish the outcome of the story into the hands of the audience.

Looking out across the sea of fourth grade faces, some look as if they wish they were somewhere else, some are fiddling with the string on their sweatshirt and yawning, some are trying to share secrets from the teacher at the back of the room and some are waiting…yes, waiting for what comes next.

How can I keep telling without some measure of knowledge about whether or not what I am telling has any meaning for them or even makes any sense? I am looking for changes in facial expression, sounds they may make in response to the story, but in the end I just don’t know what is going down.

Still, I keep telling. I vary the cadence of my words, allow for pauses and linger on pairs of eyes to encourage connection. In the end, I never know. One little boy who always sits quietly to the side of the group and speaks no English keeps staring at me. I have no idea whether he understands anything I am saying at all.

Unexpectedly a janitor enters the room as I am telling to fiddle with the heater that hasn’t been working and 15 little heads follow him to the other side of the room. Oh my…I am distracted myself, but I manage to finish the story and the children politely clap as they are taught to do.

The students begin to file from the room and as they go, the little boy who doesn’t understand English stops, looks up at me, smiles and then pulls me close for a hug. I am stunned, but so grateful for this gesture of connection. No matter what, I tell myself, it is important to have faith in the spoken word. And today, my faith in the spoken word has been renewed by a young boy in the unspoken words of his smile and hug.

Last week I experienced an amazing moment in one class of fourth graders I am working with. We are at the point in our program where we are using stories and activities to highlight how we can make a difference by working together as a community. I retold a story that had a king and his four daughters. Each daughter had different gifts or talents. The first daughter was an artist and sought beauty through drawing and painting. The second daughter was a caregiver and had compassion for anything hurt or injured. The third daughter was spunky, always questioned the rules, and never did what she was told, and the fourth daughter was a thoughtful problem solver who ends up becoming the queen in the story.

It was my hope in this session to begin to let the students work together as a group. So for the first time, the students were going to tell the story themselves and take on the roles of the storyteller, the king and his four daughters. The students were giddy and excited and hands shot up to be the storyteller and the king. Then four students put their hands up to be the four daughters, but when it came down to the students deciding who would be which daughter there arose a problem. The first and fourth daughter roles were filled, but two students wanted to be the third daughter leaving no one to be the second daughter.

Seeing that we were at a standstill in the situation, I realized I could either choose to assign one of the two students to be the second daughter or… let them decide. I chose the latter and asked again, “Who will be the second daughter?” It was a long awkward moment, and you could have heard a pin drop in the room as the entire class seemed suspended in the question. Finally, the silence was broken as a girl – one of the two students who desired the third daughter role – said, “I will be the second daughter.” As she spoke those words she moved over to take the spot where the second daughter would stand. The class was happy and I was proud. I took a moment to recognize her gesture to give up her preferred role in order to move the activity forward for the whole group.

In a way, without her really thinking about it, she had done just what the second daughter would have done. With her choice to give up her preferred role, she saw to the compassionate wellbeing of others. It became a moment of growth for the whole class, but in that moment for me, the ending to that story changed. It was the second daughter who became the queen!