One of my favourite experiences when out on the floor in the museum is is watching our volunteers engage with visitors during our story-time sessions.
During the Iranzamin exhibition many of our volunteers shared the colourful story of the Prince of Persia during our story-time sessions. These were attended by visitors young and old. Sometimes in intimate settings of one or two visitors and at other times with very large and attentive school groups.
Benefits of Storytime
Sharing stories with our visitors provides many benefits to our visitors as well as for our volunteers.
For families, storytime allows parents and carers to experience a story with their children. Here they can engage in the story with the reader and reflect on the story later on. Younger children may not be able to read fully on their own, but they love stories! Through reading interactive stories you promote reading and communication skills. As you read by encouraging them to participate, they develop critical thinking skills and expand their vocabulary.
For volunteers sharing a story is such a rewarding and fulfilling experience to share with our visitors. Storytelling provides a great opportunity to impart knowledge and our volunteers have been amazing in relating stories back to objects and exhibitions within the museum. For some volunteers, sharing stories has come naturally and they are full of confidence. For others storytime has been a great experience to grow their confidence and skills.
There have been many times when volunteers have shared their positive storytime experiences with me – from the rewarding experience of having a young child engage and ask lots of questions to having a large group of primary school students captivated and engrossed in the story all the way to the end.
16 Strategies for Making Story Time an Interactive Experience
The following tips and tricks, aimed for younger audiences, can be applied when preparing for and conducting storytime.
- Select the right story. Choose books that have clear story lines and illustration contexts, age-appropriate themes or topics, rhythmic language, interesting vocabulary, sensitivity to diversity, and themes or objectives related to current study.
- Familiarise yourself with the book. Preview the book before reading it aloud. Look at the pictures and be familiar with the story incase you need to paraphrase for younger audiences.
- Think about learning opportunities. Identify concepts to develop, vocabulary to discuss, and questions you want to ask.
- Print key vocabulary words and illustrations. Use flashcards to introduce and discuss new vocabulary. If possible, include illustrations on the strips of paper for further engagement.
- Present the cover. Before reading the book, encourage the children to look at the book cover, describe what they see, and predict what the story is going to be about.
- Talk about the author. Discuss the role of the author and illustrator. Bring up important points such as how they work together to create the books you are reading. You could also make the connection that children are also authors and illustrators since they write and draw.
- Use your fingers. As you read the book, track the print with your finger or a pointer. This is particularly important if you are reading to a large group.
- Ask, ask, ask. Make sure to pause and involve the children by asking them questions about the reading or connection to the reading.
- Allot time for children to reflect. Allow the children to reflect on what is happening 1–2 times during the story. Have them recall details or what they think will happen next.
- Be expressive. Use facial expressions and voice variations to add excitement to the story. Don’t be afraid to be silly!
- Choose appropriate pacing. Pace the story to fit the type of book you’ve picked for storytime. Invite children to participate at the same pace.
- Make personal connections. Try to connect the book with the children’s prior knowledge or personal experiences.
- Summarise the story After reading the book, review the story plot and help the children to summarise the story. Take time to go over important themes from the story.
- Extend storytime. To extend storytime, try using these follow–up activities such as using story maps, word webs, sequencing activities, role play, story retelling with props, or flannel board characters.
- Mix it up! Vary the strategies from book to book and from reading to reading. There’s no need to use more than a handful of these strategies with each story. Younger children have an attention span that ranger from 10 to 12 minutes. Once it is exhausted, learning is no longer fun! Keep it exciting!
Adapted from KAPLAN Early Learning Company