Storytelling to Celebrate Cultural Diversity - David Heathfield

To the sound of a bell, the story begins... Once upon a time... Well, David used another word to retell a story he heard at last year's IATEFL from a teacher from Mozambique, and I dare not try to repeat it here, for fear that I will be laughed upon for a very long time. Anyway, he told us the story and it proved to be one full of engaging parts, in which we, the listeners, were invited to participate, either singing, answering a question or clapping hands.

The story about a semi-useless old donkey becomes a colorful one through his intonation and gestures, and the pauses play a definite important role. At the end, all of us are deeply involved in the demise of the poor donkey and breathe in relief when he comes out unscathed.

to make a long story short (no pun intended) he demonstrated how you can engage students by telling a story, and how you can profit from that afterwards. To name but a few, you can use the following activities with your students:

• ask them to make a still picture of one moment they particularly liked - and explain that to their peers
• ask them to tell a partner what the meaning of the story was for them
• retell the story, as if you were someone who'd seen it, in 30 - 60 seconds
• create a poem about the story
• draw a picture about the story
• imagine what happened next or before the story
• if you could give a gift to one of the characters, what would it be?

The list went on with ideas given by the audience, all worth trying.

After all, Storytelling is all about passing stories on.

You may tell the same story to 10 different groups, and you'll get different reactions, because "the human factor is what makes the language classroom a unique place: differente people, at different times, responding to activities in different ways."