Today’s blog is borrowed from some content of a story telling event I presented called Traits of a Hero. In the latest version of this presentation I present examples through story telling, history, fiction and movies of how what you learn in school is important. This is specifically geared for elementary kids but can be modified for all ages.

It only requires a reflection of my own childhood to remember that as a kid, I didn’t see how math, science and social studies was important to my life beside doing homework. I find that a good way to relate the importance of school is by identifying details in stories and fiction and show how those details are relevant to the solution of the story. If a child can see the usefulness of knowledge in a story, they might see it also in their own lives.

As a story teller I present a story called: War with Grandma. The story tells of a sixth grader who has three major water balloon fights with his grandmother. He finds her sneaky in battle and loses two days in a row. The third day he realizes a weakness if Grandma’s strategy and uses it to beat her on the third day. I later reference details in the story to various subjects in school.

Let’s make War with Grandma relevant to students in the classroom by implementing the concepts of history and social studies to the story. How did grandma and John fight their opponents? Grandma: grandma has an opponent who is faster and has better aim. She uses bobby traps to find out his location before John could attack her. John has an opponent who is not above being sneaky to win. He has to beat her by doing the unexpected. Here you can make references to historical events where opponents had to use their ingenuity to beat each other.

How about math and science? Beginning classes at school we learn 1 + 1 = 2. Kids learn sums and totals and about limited resources. John realizes that Grandma is thinking in the two dimensional realm. To win the water balloon fight he must fight at the three dimensional level.
Q: In the final battle between grandma and John why did grandma throw her balloons like she did? She threw her balloons from ground level to hit John who is on the roof. The balloons arched into the sky before they drop toward him. Here we can discuss gravity, motion, trajectory.
Q: What scientific knowledge was grandma using by installing bells in bushes and ducks under boards? Sound.

Now is a perfect time to provide some examples from real history:
1. The American Colonies had to fight a difficult opponent The British were known to have the greatest army on earth at the time. Maybe discuss the various battles, or the Washington’s spy network etc.
2. In Utah New arrivals have to figure out how to plan seed in a parched land. They resolved this by flooding the ground with water to soften the soil so they could plant. They used an irrigation system to distribute water to the parched land to keep plants watered.

In this discussion we can discuss three important traits of a hero: Brains, Courage and Perseverance. Let’s gives some specific examples:

Brains:
1. Q: How did George Washington accomplish a surprise attack against the German Hessians during the war of independence? He took advantage of his natural resources by crossing a river under the cloak of darkness and flog.
2. In the creation of the nation of the united states one of the founding fathers was a fellow by the name of James Madison. One might call him a book work with all the study he did. He and others studied a lot of books to get ideas on how to form a government. Others got involved too like John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Each of them brought their talents to help create the United States of America.
3. A guy lived in Idaho and Utah, Philo Farnsworth at age 15 was plowing a field, it was very very boring. But it also gave him time to think. As a writer, I used to work several years at a sewing factory. Believe me, you get a lot of time to think. He was trying to figure out how a visual image could be transmitted across a wire. While plowing a field, he came up with the beginning of his invention. Doing line by line by line of plowing a field inspired him to create the television by first transmitting one thing line of video across the screen. Then it was followed by another line. Each was stacked on top of the other to create a whole image.

Courage: Lous and Clark were given the assignment by Thomas Jefferson to explore the American frontier. One only needs to read their journal entries to learn about their challenges against the elements, the land and limited resources when they no longer had beads to barter.

Perseverance: Alexander Graham Bell inventor of the light bulb, telephone, phonograph, metal detector. It didn’t come easy. Often he experienced failure after failure after failure. A reporter asked what do you think of all your failures? I think of them as ways they don’t work.

As a writer and story teller, it is my and others goals to make a story as exciting as possible. The author of Harry Potter accomplished this. I learned she would have something new happen in her book every 4 pages. Writers also want to do what is called the try/fail cycle where there is a problem in the story. The hero tries to fix it. The problem gets worse. Three tries and in the end the hero finally wins.

So let’s discuss the traits of a hero from fiction’s perspective. What a etter examp.le than Harry potter. Let’s discuss the traits of the hero of harry:
1. Courage: harry fights the snake.
2. Perseverance: Harry has been bitten by the snake. Does he give up? No
3. Brains: Harry doesn’t know how to release Ron’s sister from the book. He sees his resources and uses the fang from the snake and impels it into the book.
Hermione and Ron also go through their hero’s journey.

If opportunity permits you can also touch upon the movie Lord of the ring and discuss the heroes journey of each of the four hobbits.

This is a combination of using storytelling, Fiction, movies, real history and School Topics in a classroom. Make them all connect in the pretend and it is easier to relate character and knowledge into the now.

What ideas do you have on this discussion?