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In: Children & Young Adult Reading·How To ...·Teaching & Education
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #474.
The book is a practical guide for teachers, librarians and anyone who wishes to use oral storytelling with children. It opens with a heartfelt acknowledgment of the mentors and collaborators who helped the author shape the work, followed by a detailed table of contents that maps out the topics she will cover, from the purpose of storytelling in school and how to choose and adapt tales, to techniques for delivery and specific classroom applications. The introductory essay then launches into a vivid anecdote about an Italian street storyteller, using that scene to illustrate the magnetic power of a spoken tale compared with a mere reading. From this point the author argues that the freedom of the teller, the personal filter of enthusiasm, and the immediate connection with listeners make storytelling an especially effective educational tool.
Written in the clear, earnest prose of the early twentieth‑century pedagogical literature, the voice is scholarly yet conversational, peppered with personal observations and occasional literary references. Readers who appreciate instructional manuals that blend theory with concrete examples, such as teachers, early‑grade educators, and librarians, will find the step‑by‑step advice and the extensive list of adapted stories particularly useful. The work also appeals to anyone interested in the history of oral tradition and its revival in modern classrooms, offering both historical context and hands‑on techniques without demanding prior expertise in storytelling.
The opening · free to read
These facts are the basis of my hope that the book may be of use to those who have much to do with children.
It would be impossible, in the space of any pardonable preface, to name the teachers, mothers, and librarians who have given me hints and helps during the past few years of story-telling. But I cannot let these pages go to press without recording my especial indebtedness to the few persons without whose interested aid the little book would scarcely have come to be. They are: Mrs Elizabeth Young Rutan, at whose generous instance I first enlarged my own field of entertaining story-telling to include hers, of educational narrative, and from whom I had many valuable suggestions at that time; Miss Ella L. Sweeney, assistant superintendent of schools, Providence, R.I., to whom I owe exceptional opportunities for investigation and experiment; Mrs Root, children's librarian of Providence Public Library, and Miss Alice M. Jordan, Boston Public Library, children's room, to whom I am indebted for much gracious and efficient aid.
My thanks are due also to Mr David Nutt for permission to make use of three stories from English Fairy Tales, by Mr Joseph Jacobs, and Raggylug, from Wild Animals I have Known, by Mr Ernest Thompson Seton; to Messrs Frederick A. Stokes Company for Five Little White Heads, by Walter Learned, and for Bird Thoughts; to Messrs Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co. Ltd. for The Burning of the Ricefields, from Gleanings in Buddha-Fields, by Mr Lafcadio Hearn; to Messrs H.R. Allenson Ltd. for three stories from The Golden Windows, by Miss Laura E. Richards; and to Mr Seumas McManus for Billy Beg and his Bull, from In Chimney Corners.
S.C.B.
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