Storytelling and Other Magical Moments

This year I decided to link the creation of personal story boxes to our Unit of Inquiry, Where We Are in Place and Time.  Here is the story of our stories.

As our kindergarteners prepare for their seasonal concert, The Festival of Light , we consider light in all parts of our learning. How does light change our decisions when we play? How does light enhance our stories? How is light different in different celebrations? How do light and dark make us feel? We offered little lights during play engagements and Writer's Workshop. The element of light was uniquely different to each child... The light was there to hold the princess and to make it pretty. - Esma The light in my story was thrown at the football player to knock him down by the fan. - Tigran The light helped find the way back home. -Anthony The light was the mom (an angel light) and magic for the poor people. - Mia The light helped the football guy and the pig go further along on the path. - Alex The light told the pets to take off their jewelry. - Juliet The light got hot and melted the snow. - Konstantin Above children are wo...

My first attempt at using Adobe Spark Pages.

In a discussion about where we live and who we live with, my students decided to use the language of numbers, something they already knew a bit about, to have a silly conversation. We drew our homes and families, created homes with loose parts, described them, what we had in them and talked about the differences between homes and apartments. A Family  A House An Apartment How many families live there? How many people live in your home?   Do you have neighbors? How do you get to your home? What floor do you live on, what number? "100, I do"  declared, Kseniia "No, no 1million, soooo tall!" yelled Gennady "Five MILLION!! We see the plane and clouds. "lLaughed Alex We laughed together and I showed my surprise and I asked: "How long does the elevator take? How many stairs are there? If you walk up and down how will you feel? What can you see out your window?" We acted out walking up the stairs panting, b...

Discussions in our unit, Sharing the Planet , took a turn into the deep, dark, sea.  Below are short stories created about deep sea animals and other interests the children found as we inquired into the Abyss.     Just learned how to use this today - Adobe Spark Video. Simple and sweet. Still working on quality control, but can produce something nice in a very short time with young children.

An eager student kindly borrowed a storybox to take outside and retell the story in the sun with some friends. I wasn't in class when she returned it and this is what I found. " I brang the story box back." Authentic Writing! A sneaky pictures of some students borrowing a box for a storytelling session during their outdoor time.

Throughout the school year I find it so important to reflect on my practices and read more about teaching writing to young leaners. There is quite a bit of information available and finding the most inspring, fun and developmentally appropriate way of teaching writing is a goal of mine each year. I try new things, look at each group of students through a new (open minded and optimistic) lens and collaboratively with my team try to make our writing lessons the best they can be. This year my team and I decided to focus on oral storytelling first, as writer's workshop sessions and then focus on illustrations and finally "writing" within the first two months of school. (Although this would look different for each child). This is the beginning of the graphic organizer we used to begin our storytelling workshops. As you can see from my other blog posts, storytelling is a high priority in my lessons. Opportunities to develop language structures and vocabulary an...

I take it upon myself to find inexpensive ways to further develop story boxes, loose parts creations and writing prompts. I look at all recycleable materials, dollar stores, garage sales, brockis (Swiss second hand stores) and fleamarkets. After visiting a fleamarket (Baar Flohmarkt) on a beautiful Saturday, for less than 20 dollars I found Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, a Transformer, a Japanese Kokeshi doll, a bride and groom, metal car, 3 Hello Kitties, a glass scuba diver, a glass dolphin, 3 My Little Ponies, a new story box and old keys. Monday storytelling is looking good.

In order to give a focus to some regular (and lengthy) storytellers, I searched for ways to keep stories moving and also help give them a beginning and a middle and an ending. I read about creating "story bracelets" or "story beads." Story Beads The green bead (go) signifies the beginning of the story. Once upon a time... One day... Once there was a girl... A long long time ago... The middle beads signify the other parts of the story. Other ideas and plot of the story. Then, And Next, Next, And then... The red bead (stop) shows the author/storytelling that the end is near that he/she should end the story very soon. Story beads have really helped students keep track of their ideas and have added to their vocabulary related to story crafting.

As my team of teachers planned this past school year we often used In Pictures and In Words , by Katie Wod Ray, to look for new illustration techniques and also to focus in on where our students were and think about what we could do next.  Below are some of the most valuable technique and tools used to provide different focus on illustrations this year. Details of Expression and Feelings Details of People (See other blog post) Details of Characters Using Favorite Characters  Details of Characters Using Favorite Pop Culture Details of Weather Details of Time, Light, Day, Seasons Details using different tools (Black fine tipped pen, crayons, marker, water colors) Details to show Motion and Sound  Designing Placment of Words and Pictures Using Size of Words to Convey Mearning Designing Print to Convey Meaning and for Visual Effect Designing a Cover Zooming on a Specific Detail (Animals) Using Borders, Boxes, Charts, Graphs, Maps and other Graphic Features U...

Princesses and Castles. This is how it all started. A simple backdrop that gave one student with very limited English a "private" quiet space to practice language.  The language and the world she loved. It was a world full of, "Wa-su-ponee-tie (Once upon a time)" and "Dey-lii-happy-ezer-afer (They lived happily ever after)" two of the few sentences she spoke. So I went with it. She would sing and try new words, ask and point to things around the class. Princesess, Frozen, Elsa, Anna, Cinderella, witches, unicorns, jewels, love, kisses, marriage, death and horses. She would sing her stories loudly and other students would watch. They were not as interested in princesses, but in telling their own stories around the castles was definitely cool. Storytelling with a simple castle scene. She was able to focus on the language she wanted and needed to be successful, intrinsically motivated and have fun. Others didn't want to tell stories with a ...