Part 2

652 Words2 Pages

Storytelling is a powerful tool that everybody own and is a part of everyday communication. Telling stories help us to learn about ourselves and others. “The process of finding our voices, naming our lives, and telling our stories is central to what I understand about the experience of empowerment” (Carter, 1994, p. 85). Through storytelling, we learn more about ourselves, our feelings, values and influences to people around us. By being aware of oneself, we acknowledges our “authentic voice with its hopes and fears, questions and confusion” (Carter, 1994, p. 85). We can adapt the stories to fit the specific listeners. Children are then being exposed to body language and facial expressions of the storyteller. It aids in their understanding as they connect to the language. (Isbell, 2002 p. 18). In turn, we help children to understand that they are all storytellers and fosters a sense of self and belonging in safe and secure community, nurturing the growth of self-esteem.
We retell stories because we know that children enjoyed the story. From my previous incidental learning experiences, children loves retold stories. “Several retellings of a favourite story by the teacher or the children over a period of time allow children to clarify their ideas and pick up additional details of the content” (Isbell, 2002 p. 20). Retelling stories allow children to form positive feelings about stories. It exposes children to vocabulary, sentence structure which they can utilize during their own storytelling. Children enjoyed being able to predict the tale, providing opportunities for their participation during the retelling process. This repeated experiences provided the opportunities for children to develop literacy concepts such as words and pr...

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...lly has a direct influence on the children’s ability to write a story later” (Horn & Giacobbe, 2007, p. 20). Children who are engaged in the storytelling to creator of their own stories, can be greatly motivated to master the aims of emergent literacy as they want to establish their stories in both oral and written form (Isbell, 2002 p. 21).

Works Cited

Carter, M. (1994). Finding our voices- The power of telling stories. Child Care Information Exchange, July-/August, 85-88.
Horn, M. & Giacobbe, M. E. (2007). Talking, drawing writing lessons for our youngest writers. Portland: Stenhouse Publishers.
Isbell, R. T. (2002). Telling and retelling stories: Learning language and literacy. National association for the Education of Young Children, 57, 26-30.
NTCE. (1992). NCTE guideline on teaching storytelling: A position statement from the committee on storytelling.

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