Please welcome my first guest blogger: Kathleen Lund. She attended a wonderful story teller’s workshop last Saturday (I was sad I missed it) and here is her review. The presentation was by Kevin Cordi.
Those are a few things I learned just this morning and thought I’d share. Do you have a pretty juicy piece of advice that has helped you? Please share and provide your web site.
The workshop was AMAZING. I wish it was a l o n g e r & full semester class if not even longer than that!
First, we introduced ourselves with true statements framed as false; as in “My name is NOT Kathleen and I was NOT late, and I am NOT married….” you get the idea. We tried to remember names and something about each person. That info was used later as we did a continuing story that wove in info others had disclosed. When something about a person was used in the story that person was the next one to continue the story, and on and on.
Then we told to each other in pairs. We did this in many ways. The first time we did pairs the person who told me a story told it in Spanish (which I don’t speak). Then we were directed that the listener was to tell the story just heard back to the first teller! Since the teller had used a lot of hand signs I knew it included a house, a bull (it was really a donkey), a river and a snake. So, using those elements I made up a story. Amazingly, I was somewhat close. That was a bunch of fun.
Other things we did to mix up stories while in various pairs:
switch off telling the same story whenever Dr. Cordi clapped his hand but each teller had to use a different feel or emotion in the telling
Retell a story with the location/setting or environment changed
Start the story with a sound
The last hour Dr. Cordi coached two baby, in-development stories. He and the teller would sit side-by-side on chairs. The rest of us would participate as directed to provide background sounds or be part of the story if it was a scene with people around. For example, we (the crowd) bargained with a trinket seller in India for one teller and sang softly for the other teller. Dr Cordie would talk to the teller as he/she was telling and ask questions about where people in the story were standing, or why a particular statement. person or topic was important to the teller. I’m sure this isn’t clear. It is almost impossible to explain. …But, it was amazing and really helped the teller go deeper into the motivation and action of the story. Holly, from our group, was the second person coached. Her story is about her love for tandem bikes and the whole process was so funny! –to include her telling part of it from the perspective of a goose, when Dr. Cordi asked.
One thing we did many times was to raise our hands and say, “I give myself permission to play.” Play has seldom been so fun!
He gave us this quote:
“Don’t you stop doing something you love because someone told you that you couldn’t do it.”
He is a nationally known storyteller and teacher who specializes in assisting young people, even those with special needs, to participate in individual and “ensemble storytelling.” He has a masters in Storytelling Education and is co-author of Raising Voices: “Youth Storyteling Groups and Troupes” He said he loves people to contact him or gather resources from his website: kcteller@scbglobal.net
That’s about what I can remember right now. Loved it ,loved it, loved it!
