Last term we introduced a ‘Story
Telling Table’ after Kim had seen a similar set up in another kindergarten. Our
table had the same story displayed on it for a week or so, along with small
beautiful props that supported the dialogue of the book. Some of the favourites enjoyed by many children were classics like ‘The Three Little Pigs’
and ‘The Owl and the Pussycat.”
Jack re-tells his version of 'The Owl and the Pussycat - “The turkey and the cat and the owl and the pig
all went in the green boat. They went in the water and had fun. They danced in
the moon, in the moon and went back in the boat.”
Because they were out for a lengthy
time we found that some children would revisit the ‘Story Telling Table’ over
and over again. This lead to them building on their knowledge and confidence in
re-telling the stories to themselves, as well as their peers and teachers.
On a few occasions the stories
were read at group times, along with the props. This increased the
participation of this experience immensely. Upon reflecting on this and
thinking about how we could enhance this delightful experience for the children
we decided to connect our group time and the ’Story Telling Table’,
by incorporating it into our daily routine. We have now re-named the table '
Book of the Week’. The book on display is read at group time everyday.
"Reading stories provides the perfect oral language support – they provide
both stimulation and motivation. While sharing a book encompasses much more than
simply reading it." (Konza, 2012)
Pippa tells Lali her version of 'The Tiger who came to Tea', “He drunk all of the cups and Mum said ‘OH NO,
it’s all a mess and no food is here’. And then we had to go to the café.”
Our first book was ‘The Tiger
Who Came to Tea’. So many children were elated; they knew this story as it
was a book they often read at home. Making connections like this made the
experience so much more meaningful and powerful for their learning and
development. These children were leaders at the ‘Story Telling Table’ as they
re-told the story over and over to their friends and teachers. They also were the children who would help
tell the story confidently at group time. Over the week the children who
were not so familiar with the book soon demonstrated their learning, as they began to competently join in the experience with joy and enthusiasm.
"The humble act of
reading a book to a young child has repeatedly been found to have remarkable
power." (Rodriguez, Tamis-LeMonda, M. E. Spellmann et al., 2009)
Our second week has been met
with the story of ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff’. Once again this was very
popular. Children who knew the story took the lead and guided their peers as to
what was to happen. Some children spent nearly the whole of Monday morning at
the experience, happily sharing the space with other children who wanted to
come and go.
Te Whariki (1996) recognises that story
telling plays an important role in terms of children developing skills and
knowledge. The curriculum shares that children should experience an environment
where they have a familiarity with stories and symbols from their own and
others cultures. In doing this children develop an expectation that words and
books can amuse, delight, comfort, illuminate, inform, and excite. When
children are engaged in story-telling and reading books they learn that both
the text and the illustrations carry the story, that print can be useful, that
books can provide information, and that stories can allow one to enter new
worlds.
Story telling is a wonderful
skill that we love to foster at Mairtown Kindergarten. We really want to
support the notion that our kindergarten has a story telling ‘culture’. We feel
that the addition of our ‘Book of the Week’ table already has, and will continue
to enhance and extend our children’s learning and development in so many
ways. One learning area that we see it greatly supporting is our children’s
oral language development. The familiarity of the stories allow for the child
to play around with their ideas, especially the descriptive language that
they use to express this.
“Storytelling
provides an influential and effective platform for promoting children’s social,
emotional, cognitive and physical development. Stories can be integrated into
mat times, in the sandpit, at the carpentry or play dough table, alongside the
literacy area … anywhere, any time in fact - thereby increasingly modelling and
creating a storytelling culture.” (Davis, 2014)
In addition when the children
are engaged in this experience with other children they delve into the world of
peer tutoring, where one child shares their knowledge with another and extends
on each others learning and development. Again the descriptions of the story are a great
space for lots of learning amongst small groups.
The book of the
week table creates a lot of social interaction and allows for children involved
to practice the notions of being both a listener and a story teller. Listening in particular is a great skill to learn. It helps children gain an
understanding that by actively 'tuning-in' they are able to participate
in more meaningful ways with their peers and teachers.
One of the most delightful
outcomes that we have noted since introducing the ‘Story Telling Table’ and ‘Book of the Week’ is the confidence that the children are displaying. They radiate with
pride as they realise that their story telling skills are bringing joy and
capturing the interest of others. This is often displayed in the longevity that
they spend at this experience and the frequency that they revisit.
“Books and storytelling give children the opportunity to develop
the knowledge, skills and attitudes they need to use complex symbol systems
that make up our society. This includes the written word, visual images and
oral communications. Reading, writing, listening, and talking form the basis of
children's literacy learning. Children need lots of language together with a
wide variety of experiences. Sharing books and reading is a vital activity for
children's development. Children who experience and enjoy reading books with
others develop a positive attitude towards books.” (education.govt.nz)
We look forward to watching our
children’s interest and confidence grow within the contexts of re-telling
stories and enjoying having books read repeatedly. So much learning, thinking and
reflecting happens when children have the time and space to revisit experiences. We believe that by being able to revisit stories over and over
we are creating rich and meaningful opportunities for our children to extend on
their literary knowledge and verbal language.
"The humble act of
reading a book to a young child has repeatedly been found to have remarkable
power." (Rodriguez, Tamis-LeMonda, M. E. Spellmann et al., 2009)
Hei konā mai,
Zair
