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Welcome to Stories That Stick with me, Laura, as your resident storyteller. I'm here to show you how oral stories inspire and captivate minds young and old. Tune in each week to hear a compelling story and join in meaningful conversations. I'll be digging deep into the heart of storytelling, connection, and listening.
So whether you're a kid, teacher, caregiver, grandparent, or simply a lover of stories, This podcast is for you. Join me as you get lost in another world and discover how stories shape our lives. Here's to the next page in our story.
Laura: Thanks for joining us. I have here one of my, close friends and mentors from the Boston Public Schools.
And if you've been following me for a while, you've heard me talk about how they've implemented storytelling and story acting in their early childhood department and through Pre K to second grade. And so I have Marina Boni here to share with us her expertise, and we're going to chat about adults as storytellers.
So before we get going, I mean, of course, I know your story, but I'd love for people to hear a little bit about who you are and what's brought you to where you are in your life and career now.
Marina: Thanks, Laura. It's really a pleasure to be here with you today on this beautiful, sunny day, at least where I am sitting.
, Well, my career goes back a few decades plus at this point., I was a teacher for a long, long time in a pretty amazing small community based program in the city of Cambridge for about 20 years there, where I did, where we facilitated curriculum that was really generated from children and inspired by the pedagogical ideas of Reggio Emilia in Italy.
And where, in fact, storytelling wasn't really a distinct part of what we were doing, but it was always a part of what we were doing, because we really believed in the fact that when kids play, they're really telling stories, and there is a lot of, like, juicy, important things that are happening when kids play.
Tell their stories through play, you know, , and so from there, then I ended up in Boston because my boss for almost 20 years came and found me in my classroom and brought me over to be a coach. And initially we rolled out a program for four year olds in Boston in the actual public schools using the owl and building blocks curricula and then from there we sort of built on to add kindergarten, first and second grade and even backtrack now to where we even have curriculum and classrooms for three year olds.
So it's really a span of like five grade levels. And within that, um, I was trying to think back on the date. I think it was 2012. I'd read a bunch of Vivian Paley's books throughout, , my career. And somehow through the connection with Ben Mardel, we were able, and Jason actually, invite her, Jason, my old boss, invite Vivian to come to the kindergarten conference.
And she came and sort of launched this project. And this was, you know, over 10 years ago now and it's a project that we ended up calling Boston listens, as in the ideas that we're listening to kids because we're listening to their play we're listening to their stories. And so we had a bunch of, you know, amazing seminars Laura that you were a part of right away, the beginning.
to sort of really talk to teachers about what this technique would be about. And then we were so really enamored by the simplicity of the technique of like capturing children's stories and acting them out that we thought it would be wise to write it into the curriculum for all of the grade levels in different ways.
And that was a pretty special thing. And as we did that, we added a little bit. , well, the components, just not the capturing of story and acting them out, but also this role of adults telling stories was really important. The connection to families was really important, and also the possibilities for children.
To communicate stories in different ways, but really, I still feel like the most important things are really adults, the storytellers, the capturing of children's stories and the dramatization of the stories. I could go on and on as you can see. I know.
Laura: Well, when I think back to that as well, I think what, what actually happened is we had the seminar before Vivian came out.
So we were like. In the weed we were still, we were trying to do, yeah, we were like, I was like the cohort that we did like these seminars all through the year and learned it and tried, our own ways of doing it and embracing it. And then she came and that's when, that was really the big push to roll it out.
And I, you know, we'll never forget hearing her speak and just like you said, just her really. solidifying what could be the simplicity of it. And, the advice I always give people that, come to me and are like, well, what does this look like? How do I do it? I say the thing you always told me, like, just put it on your schedule.
Because once it's there and you have a rhythm and routine with it, it only takes 10 minutes a day and it can be done in so many ways during transitions and meals and outside and so many opportunities for it to happen. It can easily happen once you just get over that little barrier of like, I can't do it or there's no time.
, and the simplicity of it is what really is the beauty of it as well as. Yeah. That it's the Children. It's us. I think Ben Mardell always said at the heart of it is listening to Children and listening to their stories.
Marina: Absolutely. And it's also like, for me, it's really critical that teachers gain sort of some level of intentionality as to why we're doing it.
Because we listen to children and then what happens, what is all the magic that happens in their brain and their cognition, their social emotional well being and their creativity that can happen because of this just such a short little amount of time that we're spending listening to them and dramatizing magically the stories on the stage.
You know, a stage that we make up. Right. Exactly.
Laura: And that, and that by listening to them, it, it models to the other children the way that they can find out more about their peers. And that was, the thing that I love the most was the sense of community. That it created and that children could start to get to know other children and their interests.
And they knew so and so was always going to tell a story about a monster and so and so was always going to tell a story that had two princesses that went, to a birthday party and they start to understand and know what other kids are interested in. And it gave this, this entry point into, , playing with them or a relationship with them.
Marina: Yeah, and I think it also does even further, and I remember a story in particular from your class about this idea that we can really be inspired by each other's ideas and passions. I do remember, Laura, when you called me and you said to me, Okay, I'm on my number 98 or 99 of Ninja Stories. What the heck do I do now, you know?
And you were just so struggling with the fact that, like, this group of, like, a lot of boys, I think, that you had that year, and all the girls were all telling these Ninja Stories, and it was their way to come together as community member and share in this, like, creative fashion with each other. It was just a beautiful thing, even though We did give him some guidance for trying different things.
It's still kind of, I feel like it stayed with you for that whole year. Like it didn't really leave.
Laura: It did. And , it's so funny, you know, hindsight, looking back, I'm like, wow, I bet so many amazing things were happening in those stories. If I could have just taken off whatever that adult lens was that was so stuck on, they weren't telling.
Good enough stories like whatever it was there was an issue for me that the stories they were telling were building upon each other were incorporating each other's characters, and in hindsight it's like oh my goodness what was happening was actually magical and beautiful and wonderful, and I couldn't see that but I do remember that coming up at some point with Vivian and she shared how.
That that was the work that she did. And then she would tell stories and what her stories would be. And I distinctly remember her saying that she would be a character herself and tell her experience of it as the teacher, and and hearing all these stories or whatever, , to see how that shifts it.
And so I'd love to speak a little bit about that because you were the one that really helped me Embrace and understand the importance of within the classroom, modeling stories and a variety of stories and ways stories can be told as, as the, adults in this space.
Marina: Right. I mean, I like to always say it.
I know you've heard me say this. We're all storytellers, right? There is. It's like something that connects us all as humans is the fact that we tell each other about each other's stories and lives and things through telling the telling of stories.
Right now you and I are telling stories. We're reminding each other of like things that have happened in the past by retelling stories that we have, lived through in our lives. And so I think that this idea of adults then in classrooms not being part of this process was kind of like a missed opportunity, not to mention the fact that clearly because of In Boston, the multi linguistical, you know,, the many, , multiple language learners in, in, in, in Boston and all kinds of different kinds of things going on with kids, the idea that they could have models of stories, not because I, I was thinking about, well, now they're going to understand beginning, middle, and end, that was not the idea at all, but just the idea of what is possible that can happen in a story, , Was really, really, really important.
I remember one time long, long ago, being in a classroom with a group of children and I went and I told the kids a story and I was there with some colleagues and so somehow it happened that we were able to like capture like seven stories from the kids, which never happens, right? You maybe capture a second.
I told them a story. We got like seven or eight stories from the kids and most of the children retold a version of my story. These were all, Native Spanish speakers who were learning English, four year old. And the teacher kept on saying, Oh, you're copying Miss Marina, you're copying Miss Marina.
And I said, They're doing exactly what they're supposed to do. They're hearing an idea, they're understanding what might be, and then they're taking that idea, and they're inspired to make it happen in their own way. And, it was a shift also for the teacher to say, Oh, yeah, I get it now. This is how kids learn.
Kids learn by, like, hearing something. And trying it out themselves, themselves, just like in the story of the ninja, trying it out in their own way, reproducing it, um, in a different kind of way. And so that's why inspiration happens. But I think that there is multiple things that happen. One is definitely the modeling, but two is this critical bit about, creating a storytelling community.
And that means that everybody needs to be part of it. It can't just be the kids who are telling stories. Everyone needs to tell stories. And for teachers, this is hard. You know this, Laura, they, they just, they, it's out of their comfort zone. I always say everybody in education should take at least one theater class because that would help them to just, I feel like they can just be creative and imaginative.
And I think that's And I, I can be, I can come up with a story off the top of my head, in the morning while I'm taking a shower and then bring it to the school and, retell it in a different way. Then I'm going to come to your classroom and retell it, but it's going to be a different story because your kids are different, than the other group I was in.
But for many people, it's different. So it's important to have guidance for how to do it and for teachers to know that it's totally okay to start with you. Tell them what you did this morning. Tell them what you did on the weekend. Tell them about your crazy cat adventures. Or whatever. I would love to push adults to become more and more creative and think about imaginative moments.
Like, I like to tell stories that are about, the story begins as something that seems like Something that really could have happened to me and then suddenly some kind of magical element comes in that like makes the story go totally out of whack and surprising and exciting for kids to hear that kind of thing.
And then I see them doing the same thing, and as adults, we're always like, are you telling the truth? This is a story that doesn't matter what they're telling. Don't worry. Wait, there really was a, you know, I'm just like, this doesn't matter. Don't worry. And I think
Laura: innately that that starts.
That's really how many children's stories start, right? So many of them will be how they got to school, right? Oh, I got out of bed, I woke up, I go on the bus, and then all of a sudden the imaginative thing happens, right? It's like this little bit of comfort. You have to start with what . So you're starting with a personal narrative, you're recounting something that happened to you.
And what you're saying as far as this is hard for teachers to tell stories. It's one of the biggest things that I find that shocks me. I'm not so shocked by anymore, but twofold my audience, they say, who is Vivian Paley? And I'm like, ah, and then they're like, well, I'm not creative enough to tell a story.
And it's like, , and but we feel that as adults in so many aspects of our lives, we don't, if you're not at a paint night where there's an instructor leading you through how to paint, you might freeze in front of a blank canvas. If a kid says to you, sing me a song and you feel like you have to suddenly make up a song, you freeze.
And so in our back pocket, we keep books and we keep wheels on the bus. And we keep, geometrical shapes to paint. Exactly,
Marina: exactly. And, I think that is so well pictured. I think that that's the reason why I tell teachers, don't, like, freak out about the thought that you need to tell the kids of, the three little pigs in seven parts.
I'm selling you the one minute story approach. A one minute story. You can do this because a one minute story is so fast that if you time yourself, most of the time you're actually going to go a little over that one minute. But one minute is tangible. One minute is most likely how long the story of a child is going to be because you're giving them that one page to write it into, right?
And so it's kind of like we're modeling this like really short little stories that are happening in a quick magic moment, that, can start even as adults. And, I would love to practice this more with adults, with, with teachers. It's the idea of the one word story. You remember when Vivian came, there was one kid, and I don't know which session you were in, but there was this one very tiny little girl who told the one word story.
And Vivian said, okay, sweetie, you tell me the story. She came over and said the story, and the story was flower. So Vivian wrote it down, flower, waited, that was it. Are you gonna be the flower? The girl was like, yep, I'll be flower. And then she like got onto the stage and literally bloomed in the most amazing, like, you were just like right there in her flower.
And I think so, I think that as adults we overthink things when it can be really quite simple. Absolutely. And I think the simplicity is what this is all about. It's a complex things in terms of what metacognitively is happening in children's brain, but it's really simple.
Laura: Also, it is.
And that's what we do as you know, that's when our adult things and whatever, Takes over that those thoughts that we have where we don't know how to play anymore. We don't know what to do. We can't, we many of us struggle with that, right? The blank canvas of in whatever way it is. And as children, they don't struggle with that, right?
They have it. And unfortunately, it's it's lost through a variety of things. And what we want to do is it. Keep that sacred for the Children that are in our spaces and that are learning and let them be three and four and five that are,, naturally telling stories and not saying, and what happened next to the kid that said flower because In her mind, she was going to do this interpretive dance of blooming into a flower, right?
She knew that was her story. And so it's so easy for us to pass the judgments that we're giving to ourselves off onto our children. And the more, like you said, that we can just tell stories, one of the things that I really try to drive home when I'm sharing with other people about just trying it, just telling a story.
That's a great tip to say, just set your timer for one minute, try it for one minute, and then you can abandon ship. You can just say the end. That's it. Bye. The end. The other thing that I say is, really, the kids do not care as much about the content of your story. As they do about you being present in that moment that your phone is away that you're not Talking to another child that you're not talking to the whole group that you're not thinking about Okay, we're about to transition to the bathroom and then we're going to do this I'm going to do this and you're like half paying attention to what they're doing What they care about is that you're there with them in that moment and I find I can mindlessly read a book I could read a whole read aloud to a group of kids and not remember a word of it Because I'm just reading it, right?
But you can't shut your brain off in that same way when you're telling a story. If you're really telling it. Right. Because you have to be thinking on the fly. Even if you're retelling the Billy Goats Gruff. And so I think that, Maybe some of the challenge for us as adults is that we have to be fully present and being fully present in our lives right now is just not a strength of many of us because we multitask so often.
I
Marina: agree. And I think that also it's about, I go back to this like sense of theatricality that is a little bit needed in the way that an adult tells a story, right? Because I could tell you a story in a total flat tone. And the kids are going to be rolling on the rug. And the moment instead, I'm really in it, like the way that you're describing, I'm in it.
I'm in it with my voice, I'm in it with my body, I'm in it as much as I can be for whoever I am in the world. Everybody doesn't need to be as crazy as I am. It changes everything. So when we were doing this work with Ben Cunningham, our colleague, he like, even got, , People to practice voice tonality, like, what if you are the little bear with a squeaky voice?
And what if it's you have a deep, deep voice and so you're the little bear talking, and like how that changes the possibility of entry for the children into your story, and how that modeling also changes for them an idea of how you communicate that story. How are people really going to know what your story is about?
It doesn't matter. Maybe it doesn't. But if it does, some of that nuance. really, , changes. I remember re watching a video of kids acting a story,, in this classroom and one of the kids is playing the big brother and he comes on the stage standing on his stick toes. to seem bigger. So kids like get it that there is something about like stage presence and stage something that really makes a story be, be more exciting or not.
Even if the story is like really a simple story about how I lost my glasses this morning and it took me five minutes to find them. Yeah. I mean,
Laura: I, I, I find. That just like we were saying earlier about when a child is they learn through repetition, right? And not, not the adult led repetition of, a worksheet or, tell me that story again, like, but if they're asking for us to read the same book over and over.
Right? As they do when they're young toddlers and they're trying to make sense and is this, is it, are you really going to say brown bear brown bear on this page like you did last time and the time before that and the time before that? They're asking you to retell stories because they want to know, right?
Is it going to be the same? But that's the awesome part is it can shift a little bit. And then when they're repeating it, their repetition Is coming out in these ways, and that's how they're, you know, making sense of it. And we, in reality, again, back to that, like, situation with the ninjas, I couldn't have asked for more with the children to be retelling those stories with ninjas, because they were, whatever it was that they were deeper trying to figure out, if I had been more of a teacher researcher, they were probably working it out.
And if they, whenever they stopped telling ninja stories, it's because they figured it out. Same with the toddler that's, you know, in the trajectory schema and is dumping everything on the floor over and over and over because they want to know what's going to happen when I dump this, what's going to happen when I dump this.
And when they stop dumping it, it's because they figured it out.
Marina: Yeah, it's really sort of, sort of, sort of related to like cause and effect developmentally, it's so true. But the story of the ninja also reminds me of one of your kids, and I'm going to misquote him right now, but I think we were interviewing him about why the ninjas and why all this fighting on the stage, you know, and why all of the, you know, you know, bad guys and people die.
I'm gonna say, like all the stuff that happens in those kind of stories. And he basically was saying the stage is the only place where we can do that. And it's okay to do it. , he wasn't saying it in the way that an adult would have said it because he was four or five, but he was basically saying, we, as little kids, need to work this stuff out.
And storytelling and story acting is the place, is the venue, where we can work out some of this confusion we have about the stuff that goes on in the world, in our personal lives, and whatever the kind of TV stupid program that I'm watching, or whatever, and it was like such a profound message that he said that, I remember that in that interview, that I was like, yeah, I mean, because we're always telling them what not to do, and here is, that is an opportunity where we're giving them a stage, we've modeled some story, kids are telling a story, and then they're acting them out with some stage rule to help them to like, be with each other, without, with being safe, being safe with each other, even though they're, , smashing some, something up.
Laura: Yep, I do. I remember that as well. That was really that. That's really, but at the heart of it, it's like, well, this is this is where we can do this. Um, because probably at that, 10 years ago, I was probably not allowing rough and tumble play in my classroom, like if that was unfolding, the block area was, redirected.
It was, and at recess, it wasn't happening. And so that was a way for them to be exploring some of that, not just the larger concepts of death and dying and good and bad. And, Fighting and winning, but also they were throughout physically throwing their bodies on the ground. They were learning how to control their bodies in space.
I mean, so, so much was was happening there. Um, and , it really just keeps coming back to us as adults trusting the Children and their development and that they're going to be learning what they need to learn and us as the adults having to to just be letting go, right? Trusting them totally and letting go more
Marina: and be clear that there is so much learning happening.
Like in that whole scenario you described, there's so much stuff around social, emotional self regulation that happens for Children when they You know, we're not saying you're fighting on a stage and you're smacking each other up. We're saying you're going to do it with this guidance that's going to support you to be able to do it safely, you know, and that, that takes a lot for some kids.
Um, and there is a lot of learning and growth that happens in a moment that you're be able to like, to like, yeah, without like really touching somebody, you know, it's amazing.
Laura: Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, you and I are of the same mind on this, right? Like the, , we see. And have seen it over the years how important and powerful it is for children to just do this simple little thing, which is to tell a story to an adult that's listening, writing it down, and then later in the day they get to act it out in a space in front of other kids and kids can choose to participate or not choose to participate, they can tell a story or not tell a story, they can sit around the rug in the stage if they want or they cannot.
And it's all really child led it's child driven and I know that. In Boston, you all have your curriculum, but I also know that, you're a big, huge district. You have to have You can't just say, Okay, we're play based and we're letting teachers create emergent curriculum. You can't. So this is one of those ways that you can check that box of allowing for emergent curriculum to be happening alongside all this other stuff that's happening.
And then if those teachers are really listening, right, they're listening to the ninjas, they're seeing that unfold, then they can take that and tease out what is the larger bucket, right? What is the larger thing that they're trying to make sense of? Okay. It's. Community or it's life and death, or it's, you know, bodies in space.
And then then you can build out the curriculum from that and tie it in the ways that you write, that you need to. Yeah.
Marina: Sometimes teachers say to me things like, I can't find a time for when to capture the stories from children. Right. And I'm like, okay, okay. I guess you don't have those five minutes in the morning when they're arriving.
Fine. And then I always think about. This thing that really happened at your school, which was maybe in Megan's class, this idea of going to those stories. Which is a way for teachers to even better understand what's actually happening with what kids are doing, like that if you go to the story or if you create, there are ways to do it in ways that very much, uh, speak to what you were just saying that are so simple and not, and I think that, Folks, maybe we, what you're seeing right now makes me feel like I want to say more to the teachers, this is the one opportunity where there is some possibility for emergent curriculum happening because the stories themselves might be grounded in the squirrels we were just learning about, but they might not.
It could be like outer space aliens that look like squirrels and suddenly everything has changed, and that is like really, it's a really marvelous thing and I think that, you know, teachers who really do it, I have my, I always say that like Nike stole it from me, but I always say to people, just do it.
Yes, put it in your schedule, just do it. People who really do it regularly with their kids, they can see like the, the way that the stories evolve over time in their children, they can see the sense of routine. They can hear and. Probably feel the eagerness on the part of their children to be part of this community of storyteller.
Like, they're not gonna let it go by. They're gonna be like, wait, Laura, we didn't do storytelling to react. What happened? You know? Right. Like, that kind of thing starts happening. So I'm,
Laura: I'm curious. 10 minutes. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm curious. Okay. At this point, it definitely was rolled out in like, like we said, 2012.
And I mean, do you have the stats? How many, how many schools are there in Boston? How many kindergarten classes? 85. Okay.
Marina: 85 schools with like, imagine that there is probably approximately 3k through second grade, six or seven hundred kids, plus another hundred and some from community based program. We're talking 800 kids in Boston that potentially could be doing some form of this.
Right. And in all that,
Laura: right. And over the years, in the teachers that have said, okay, the, the ones that are like, you've, you've sold me, I'm, I'm in it and they're doing it. Have you ever had a teacher stop doing it? Or say this is not worth my time, or it's too hard, or any, once they're in it. I think that once they're in it, it's hard to stop.
Marina: But I think that year to year, I've noticed that sometimes because of all the demands that are happening, here this and there, now we're doing Henardy, now we're doing this, people can, Forget about it easily. And then they just need someone to say, Hey, remember the story telling, story acting thing? I'm not seeing it on your schedule.
What's happening? Oh my god, you're right. It's so true. I need to start doing it again. But I also noticed, you know, I said this to you all the time, that if I could choose what my job was in Boston was just to go around and support teachers to do this, that when I go and I model it in a classroom, like that changes everything.
Suddenly they see it happening and they're like, Oh, that's it? I'm like. Yep. Yeah, that's simple. Yeah. Well, you
Laura: know, and the perfect little bow that will wrap us up here is, , it's you,, you brought me to this because I was in that. In that classroom two years ago struggling, and I couldn't figure out how to connect with the kids the children that I was seeing were struggling so much and I was unsupported and I was just floundering and even being a senior you know a teacher that knows and does so much has been so successful and What I was in the classroom.
I mean, I was the expert at that and to feel like I was failing was so hard and all it was with you to say, Well, are you telling stories? Are you taking their stories? And and my no was not because of time because I had all the time. I know it was because I had that barrier of like, well, most of my Children.
are neurodivergent. Most of them have no language and I have no clue how to do that with them, like how to do this. And so all I did, I just set the bare minimum of tell a story and I started, they had to have probably been one minute because I started this Instagram and I started recording myself and you can only do so long in a little Instagram video and they were, the stories were And as soon as I started doing it, There was the one or two kids where I just said, do you want to tell a story?
And we're like, yup, I know what to do and tell you a story. And then by the end of the year, I was getting a child pointing on their ACC device, truck, car, house, or a kid pointing to the communication board or a kid just saying their name or repeating the story that I had told the day before.
And it was like, Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. This is something we could all feel good doing. We all felt successful in that. And that is just I mean, Vivian built her whole
Marina: curriculum. Yeah, Vivian built her whole curriculum around this, you know, this was this is what they were doing. Amazing to think about. And that experience that you had as much as I didn't want it to be as hard as it was for you.
It's revealing though, because it really reminds you of it can be done with any type of learner, as long as you have the mindfulness to say, what is their entry point into this? Oh, their entry point is to have a little thing that they can point to? Great. Their entry point is to just tell me sheep every time that they tell a story, because that's what they want to say.
Whatever, that's fine. But this is also why going back to the adult storytelling, it's so important for the adults to tell stories, because when there are children who are learning in different ways, to hear the stories, it's really useful and really supportive to their ability. To get into it, themselves.
Laura: Yep. And to provide those multiple modes of, of ways to hear the story, right? So you read Abiyoyo, and now you're telling Abiyoyo, and then you're putting Abiyoyo characters on block figurines, and putting it on, the iPad in whatever ways, right? And then putting that on their communication board.
If that's the thing, when Abiyoyo eats the sheep, yep, that's the part they love, you know? You, , it just gives you that way to really get to know the kids, and,, you. Yeah, I, I, there's not a whole lot I miss about being in the classroom right now, but it's definitely this. , it's definitely this, because doing it at home with my two kids, it's, it's a little, it's a lot different.
We do it. You're not that many people. Yeah, exactly. You can do it.
Marina: You could have, people say that to me all the time. I'm like, you know, people are like, Should I do storytelling with my kid? I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, and then we love it, but my kid, my kid told me all these stories and we're acting them out.
I mean, it's not the same as having 15 friends to do it, but still you can do it. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, you can do it. So it's a good connection to families, but that's for another time, Laura. It is for sure.
Laura: Oh, Marina, it was so nice having you on and I'll put in the show notes., I'll link Ben Cunningham's website because you mentioned that and I was just checking it out before we started and that I did you find it.
I did. Yes. And I think that that's a great resource just to think about how you can pull in other people, especially people in your community, bring in family members. I used to have family members come in and tell stories or, I mean, in this day and age, you can get them on Zoom. You can have them voice record a story when they're on their lunch break and play it in your class.
You can tell their story
Marina: in their home language. It doesn't matter what the language is, that's the thing,
Laura: and I'll link, , some of the, the stuff from Boston, just so people can see. I know you all have some snippets there of Vivian talking and some resources there that they can grab.
Marina: There is also a thing in one of the first pages, and you'll probably find it easily, that Melissa and I created. The progression. Oh, I've shared it widely. Yeah, that's really good, right? That's beautiful. We need to write a progression of this because people that are going to stop asking us why this, you know?
Yeah, so listeners for what
Laura: this is, it's, it's, they kind of mapped out the progression of what this looks like in an ideal,, let's say classroom or, or school. If a child's in a community based program as a three year old and a headstart and is exposed to storytelling and story acting and starts doing it and then goes into the.
, the state pre K is that they have and is doing it and what it looks like. And maybe little shifts that then happen up into kindergarten, up into first grade and then into second grade. And I imagine if you could, and you're doing it in the school and everybody's embraced it, the second graders can be coming down and scribing the stories of the pre K students.
I mean, there's so many opportunities for authentic literacy learning to be happening as well as cross grade, , relationships., and that progression really is beautiful. Yeah. So I'll, I'll definitely, I'll share that. And, I have, a podcast that gives my three tips on how to just tell a story that tries to break it down a little easier so it's not so scary.
We've
Marina: shared it. We have shared your podcast with all our teachers and also your website and everything, , because I think it's, , It's a beautiful, I know, I wouldn't, you know,
Laura: it is for sure. Well, thanks so much for having, , well, for having me, for joining me, it was great chatting. Thank you for, thank you for having me.
The end. But really, that's it for today's episode of Stories That Stick. Inspiring and captivating minds, young and old. Remember, stories have the incredible ability to spark conversations, ignite imagination, and create lasting connections. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe to the podcast and leave a five star review.
It really does make a difference. And, if you have a story to share or a topic you want me to explore, reach out to me on Instagram at LittleStoriesThatStick. Until next time, keep working that storytelling muscle and tell stories every day.
