As soon as I got back from Japan in January, several things completely occupied my time, until now. Teaching at Lesley U, helping to organize a union there (successfully!) and coordinating StoriesLive® -IV consumed nearly all my waking hours. We were able to reach another 1,000 high school students thanks to support from the MCC, Friends of CRLS grant and generous donations of time and money from massmouth,inc. storyteller/educators. Here is a great article by Melissa McKeon, from the Worcester Telegram about our work at South High Community High Schools where 100s of students studied with us and several SCHS students won scholarships at our Regional High School Slam. -
Norah Dooley
South High students win scholarships at Hub storytelling match
by Melissa McKeon CORRESPONDENT May 16th 2014
WORCESTER — South High Community School Principal Maureen Binienda's students have been telling stories.
In fact, three of her students are noted for their storytelling.
And Ms. Binienda couldn't be happier. Tenth-grader Manasseh Konadu, William Lam and David Judkins and seven other South students told their stories on April 26 at the Boston Public Library as part of an annual high school storytelling slam by Massmouth's StoriesLive. The three were awarded scholarships for their efforts in South's initial appearance at the event.
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South High Community School student David Judkins, who won the
Audience Choice Award at Massmouth's storytelling competition in
Boston, runs through his performance for his English class. Behind him is
10th-grade English teacher Pascalia Mattioli, ((JOHN FERRARONE)) |
It's part of Massmouth's effort to reinforce that the art of storytelling is alive and well and valuable. The program, the brainchild of Massmouth founder Norah Dooley, is curriculum-based. Teacher-artist-storytellers go to local schools to teach storytelling and end up teaching far more, it seems. StoriesLive representatives coach students through the first phase, when all students participate. They write down the outline of their stories and then tell and refine them.
It's a lesson in everything an English teacher would like to see students learn. And, in fact, it's part of what they are mandated to learn by the state's Core Curriculum guidelines, which include a public speaking requirement.
"This is a fun way to meet a Common Core requirement," says 12th-grade English teacher Joe McKay.
The success of the stories at the class level, where everyone must participate, is easy to measure: "They applaud (each other's stories) or they don't applaud," Mr. McKay said. "They let you know." The students get to refine the story for a schoolwide "slam," with voluntary participation, at which the success of the stories is once again measured by the students' reactions. Next, those students go to the regional slam in Boston, where, this year, three South students distinguished themselves by earning scholarship money from StoriesLive.
The money can be used for the purchase of a laptop or iPad/tablet, memberships online, educational accounts, college application fees, college visits, tuition for any school and even driver's education or travel.
To date, the program has given out more than $17,000 in scholarship awards to more than 6,000 high school students from 15 Massachusetts high schools.
And while the program is certainly a unique — and clearly successful — way to teach public speaking, the preparation of the story teaches another key literature and writing lesson: creating a plot that works.
"It turned out to be a great learning strategy," Mr. McKay said.
Once students moved from creating the outline of their story to telling it, the progress in learning the lessons English teachers try to reinforce was swift. "That's where you see the proof in the pudding," Mr. McKay said. "It becomes almost intuitive."
Learning those core skills through storytelling with StoriesLive was, Mr. McKay said, far more successful than the usual classroom experience.
"It's not like they're being pressured by some cranky old teacher like me," he joked.
The deeper lessons are clear, as well.
"It seems like in this day and age everyone has something electronic, no one's having conversations anymore. It's like a lost art," Ms. Binienda said. "But storytelling has existed for centuries. Oral tradition is how people learned about their culture."
For the students at South, Ms. Binienda finds it particularly important.
"We are the third most diverse high school in the state," she said.
That means the connections between these students from many different backgrounds can be tenuous, until they hear each other's stories.
The experience of hearing everything from where they're from to the first time they experienced something new to learning the hard way at once illuminates a new culture and breaks down the barriers between them.
"Kids' experiences are kids' experiences, the whole world over," Mr. McKay said. "You're not all that different."
The deeper lessons are clear, as well.
"It seems like in this day and age everyone has something electronic, no one's having conversations anymore. It's like a lost art," Ms. Binienda said. "But storytelling has existed for centuries. Oral tradition is how people learned about their culture."
For the students at South, Ms. Binienda finds it particularly important.
"We are the third most diverse high school in the state," she said.
That means the connections between these students from many different backgrounds can be tenuous, until they hear each other's stories.
The experience of hearing everything from where they're from to the first time they experienced something new to learning the hard way at once illuminates a new culture and breaks down the barriers between them.
"Kids' experiences are kids' experiences, the whole world over," Mr. McKay said. "You're not all that different." In addition to claiming that connection with their peers, they also claim something simple, yet profound, themselves.
"Being able to tell your story is important," Ms. Binienda said.
At the final slam on a Saturday during April vacation, 10 South students and their chaperones learned not only the excitement of telling their stories among their peers from schools all over the state, but also had the simple fun of what was, for many, the new experience that field trips provide. They took the train to Boston to participate in the final slam at Boston Public Library.
Mr. Konadu won first place (a $500 scholarship); close behind him was classmate Mr. Lam, who won a $250 scholarship. Their fellow South student Mr. Judkins won an Audience Choice $150 award.
For more information, visit www.massmouth.com and its Facebook page, www.facebook.com/highschoolstories.
It was a warm Saturday and Centre Street in JP was busy. When I arrived at the church hall, Horace Small, the project director, told me to head up stairs and he'd be right back after he ran a quick errand. I started as I often do by asking participants what they already knew about storytelling and what they wanted to learn. Next I ask participants to think of an experience they can use to turn into a story. I emphasize that it needn't be a huge event - in fact the lower the stakes, the easier to work on skills and structure. Horace was back right on time as I said one good story calls another and I asked him to tell a story. I was remembering his telling about being a conscientious objector back in the day the last time we had done this workshop together. But Horace had a more recent tale to tell. "Oh yes, I have a story to tell!" While on his errand Horace had been drawn into a strange altercation. "I saw this white dude punch a quadriplegic right in the face. In the face! Seemed like he may have run over the guy's feet with his chair? Not sure. But this young guy clocked him, right in the face! He hit a man in a wheel chair!! Right in front of all these people waiting to get into Centre Street Café, you know, just past JP Licks. So I step in and intervene. I say 'Hey man, Check yourself. You can't hit someone in wheelchair. What are you doing?' And I am still talking to the perp when up comes two of Boston's finest. Without a single question the police come right up to me and immediately put their hands on me! And I stop them. And I start to explain. (The quadriplegic man is well known in the area as a fierce advocate for handicapped rights and is unable to speak.- Ed.) Even with all these witnesses, all these folks waiting for their brunches and all, no one says one thing in my defense." It took a while but Horace says that finally some older white woman spoke up and said, "Why are you bothering him? And she pointed to the young white guy. "He did it." Horace had work to do so he left that sorry scene and brought back his story, fresh from the racist streets of America. Even in integrated, enlightened Jamaica Plain, when faced with a street incident, by default it always the black man who is at fault. And it takes some time for white people to step up and confront racism. As you can imagine, some amazing stories followed. 
January 2015 - June 2105 Homelessness Speakers Bureau - developing workshops to help advocates tell their stories. 
