Storytelling and ECE

Following the Guidelines of the American Psychological Association
Introduction

This essay will briefly describe six of the nine criteria a teacher considers when selecting a story to tell to the class. In this essay I will also name and describe a story for each of the three main categories of stories. Next, I will create a numbered list showing the steps teachers typically go through to prepare for presenting a story to children. The information for this essay comes from the book by Jeanne M. Machado (1975). I will go through the six key points of elementary literary instruction which are: time, texts, teach, talk, tasks, test and summary. First, I will begin with time.

Time

When choosing a story to tell to the class, an elementary teacher must think very, very carefully about how much time it will take for the story to be told to the children of the class. The teacher must carefully plan how long the story will take to tell, based on reading it slowly, clearly, as well as making the story interesting for young children. In many cases an elementary teacher must animate the story, just as the story itself is animated. This too would take time. So the actual length of the story is an important consideration for an elementary teacher to make considering that there are only so many hours in any one given day that a teacher will have with their students. Next, I will discuss texts.

Texts

An elementary teacher must think carefully about the suitability of the text, as well as the age-level to which a story is told to the class. A text must be at geared to the target age range of an elementary school class, as well as contain appropriate content concerning any religious, racial, gender, or any other non-discriminatory matters such as the latter and others that will positive material to enforce to the children with messages that will enrich their life, as well as their growing process to become strong, healthy, prosperous and productive American citizens. The suitability of the text is very important for the considerations of an elementary teacher.

Teach

Going back to the suitability of the text, the story must also teach something, or have educational value for the elementary students. It could be a story that teaches the children about time, or about cleaning their rooms at home, being good children, sharing and being friendly, learning to say “thank you,” being good to animals and other children and good people, washing their hands, loving a new sibling coming into their lives – with these variety of examples where there are already a number of children’s books available that would send a healthy teaching message to the students, an elementary teacher must think carefully about what the particular story that they choose is teaching to their students who are in the classroom to learn – not just for today – but, for the future as well.

Next, I will discuss talk.

Talk

An elementary teacher must think carefully about a story’s ability with proper time, a suitable text and good educative value to encourage early childhood students to talk. The story should generate discussion and encourage a child to discuss at the level they are at what they have learned from the story, if they have any questions concerning vocabulary, a concept, or anything else that they did not understand, to talk about the pictures and illustrations in the book, to see themselves reflected through multicultural materials and to feel included enough through the diversity of the story to talk in class…all of these factors are of vital importance in the selection of a story for an elementary school teacher.

Tasks

Since an ideal society is a productive, working and prosperous, healthy and happy society for everyone – the story that is selected for ECE must also be one that encourages or calls to action for a child student to do tasks such as playing music, singing along, clapping their hands, repeating big words and reading along as just a few examples. Young children normally have a lot of energy! . The story should not be something that would put them to sleep right away during class time unless it is time for the children to rest. The story should encourage the children to want to go play during recess and practice some of the educative values they have learned from the informative story.

Test

A good story would then test the students which is the traditional fashion of the schooling foundation. What did the children learn? When did the bear come out of the woods? How was Raquel feeling when her Mommy told her that her gold fish passed away? These important questions help to test the memories of the early childhood student and get them prepared for their future schooling careers ahead.

Summary

An elementary teacher must also factor in enough time (as mentioned before) to summarize the story.

So these are the six out of the nine criteria that should be included when selecting a story to read to an ECE classroom. Next is a numbered list that an ECE teacher goes through to prepare for a story to be read in class:

  1. Go to the school library and get a variety of suggestions from the Librarian
  2. Carefully read about two or three stories to select one for the day’s class
  3. Go through the steps mentioned above to ensure that everything is achieved in her lesson notes.

Now I will describe a story for each of the three main categories of stories.

Describing Stories

My First Book of Uppercase Letters by Kumon Publishing is a suitable “text” because it has an educative value. The book also promotes “tasks” for the child students to do. There are also many opportunities for fun “tests” from this book as well.

My Book of Numbers 1-30 also by Kumon Publishing is again a suitable “text” for its educative value. It also encourages a lot of “talk” amongst the students. The “summary” helps to remind the students of the important numbers they need to learn to succeed in life.

Finally, My First Book of Lowercase Letters by Kumon Publishing is a great book for using “time” in the class well. It teaches lowercase lettering to the students that are invaluable for elementary students to learn. This book also gets the students “talking.”

Conclusion

Elementary teachers have a lot of work to do to make the classroom environment fun and enjoyable. However, it is all worthwhile. It is the future of the children that is of upmost importance.

References

Kumon Publishing. (2004). My First Book of Lowercase Letters. New York: Kumon Publishing.

Kumon Publishing. (2004). My First Book of Numbers 1-30. New York: Kumon Publishing.

Kumon Publishing. (2004). My First Book of Uppercase Letters. New York: Kumon Publishing.

Machado, J. (1975). Early Childhood Experiences in Language Arts: Early Literacy. New York:

Wadsworth Publishing.