By initiating this Educator's Guide to Storytelling, Turner South wants to help teachers and students understand the pleasure and the benefits derived from telling stories. Everyone, old and young alike, loves a well told story. And we all tell stories. Now we have found that teachers can hold the attention of their classroom and teach not only the art of storytelling, but also the information of core subjects using stories. This teaching method brings fun into learning for today's video generation.

Students can increase their skills in both speaking and listening, as well as writing, and they can more easily retain the information found in the contents of a story. One teacher who helped in the development of this guide told of a lesson plan she used in which she told a story that contained the many products of the rain forest, rather than giving students a list of these items to memorize. Three months later, she gave them a quiz on rain forest products without having revisited the lesson, just to see what they would retain. She was amazed that the majority of her students easily remembered most of the products.

This guide includes explanations on why, how, and when to use storytelling.

• Overcome any fears about teaching storytelling.
• Use the step by step method for teaching the art of storytelling.
• Discover how to extend storytelling throughout the curriculum.
• Learn how to choose and work with professional storytellers.
• Extend the joy of storytelling beyond this initial unit.

Additionally, Turner South and Turner Learning, Inc. have created two videos to accompany this curriculum guide. One of the videos, entitled "Storytellers Video," uses professional storytellers to demonstrate the diversity of storytelling styles and genres. While the benefits of experiencing a storyteller live in the classroom can't be surpassed, there are times when that situation is not possible. Additionally, there are many kinds of storytellers and tales. Our original video production is designed to bring a variety of styles and tellers to your classroom at your convenience. The second video, entitled "Teaching Storytelling," shows teachers in the classroom using storytellng as a teaching tool with students.

For additional opportunities related to the storytelling project, please contact your local cable company for community extensions.

We truly hope that you enjoy using this Educator's Guide to Storytelling and accompanying videos in your classrooms. Please help us to continually improve our services to you by taking a moment to fill out the evaluation found at the end of this guide.

Sincerely,

TURNER SOUTH
Turner Learning, Inc.


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