Bongiorno_Cameron_Blogpost #3 (Free choice)

    

Story Props – Developing Storytelling – Mothering A Rainbow

     

     Hi again! For this post, I have decided to do a reflection on my storytelling experience using props that I completed last week. This was my second attempt with storytelling, and I must say I was not very excited to do this activity. I had enough trouble with simply holding a book and showing the pictures when I did a read aloud for my first storytelling experience. I could not even fathom holding a book to read the text and show the illustrations as well as incorporating props at the same time. I knew it would be a difficult task. In order to prepare for this activity, I watched the excellent examples of student work that our professor provided in Blackboard. These past students did amazing work and were great in showing me different options on how to use props as part of storytelling. In the first video I viewed, a woman read a book aloud as she pulled out various animals from the mouth of the cutest cardboard dog. I liked the idea of reading a book and having smaller props to enhance the story. Since I did not want to copy the former student's idea of using animals, I brainstormed what other items could be similarly used in the same way. I thought of pieces of clothing, food items, or toys. I then set out to find a book published within the last three years that contained any of these ideas. 

     I searched the internet for a suitable book. I finally settled on The Rice in the Pot Goes Round and Round written by Wendy Lan-Wong Shang and illustrated by Lorian Tu. This book was published in 2021 and contained food items, meeting both my guidelines mentioned in the paragraph above.

https://shop.scholastic.com/parent-ecommerce/books/rice-in-the-pot-goes-round-and-round-9781338621198.html

In this book, a young Asian girl describes what each of her relatives eats at the table during a family meal. It is set to the tune of the children's song "The Wheels on the Bus". Since this book is geared toward younger children ages three to five (Scholastic, 2023), I thought that these listeners would enjoy the fun and repetitive rhythm of the book (Greene & Del Negro, 2010). I also thought it would be fun to use the Asian food mentioned in the text as the props of my story. I believed that I could hold the book in one hand and show the food items with the other. At first, I considered drawing the food items but quickly realized that I did not have the skill to do so. Then I thought about including real food items as the props. Since I could barely cook basic dishes, I knew that I could not prepare the food items myself. I decided that buying the food mentioned in the book from the Asian food bar at the local Harris Teeter would be the most authentic and time-saving solution. 

     My excitement about the props began to wane, however, as I read the text a few more times. The Rice in the Pot Goes Round and Round contains several Asian words for the different family members, and I feared I would not be able to pronounce them correctly. I would never want to disrespect another's culture or language by saying the wrong thing. Also, I was worried that I would not be able to express the onomatopoeia well. In addition to these doubts, I realized that this book does not contain a plot, climax, or resolution that children find interesting when listening to or reading books at this age (Greene & Del Negro, 2010). I was back at square one. Bleh.

     One evening while my eldest daughter was attending her ice-skating lesson, I darted off to Books a Million at the nearby mall. I just knew there had to be a book there that would be suitable for this storytelling activity with props. I found a few books that could be contenders, but they were published more than three years ago. I was feeling very defeated and was getting desperate as I was running out of time; I had to leave to pick up my daughter in just a few minutes. It was right then that I came across A Very Cranky Book written by Angela DiTerlizzi and illustrated by Tony DiTerlizzi. I had never seen or heard of this book before. When I saw the publishing date was 2023, I realized why. I then read the book and fell in love with it! The way that books talk and have different personalities in this story is amazing! I had never seen anything like this before and also thought it would be interesting for the listeners. I had just enough time to locate books that represented the book characters in the story before it was time for me to go. I was super excited about my success at Books a Million!

     

A Very Cranky Book: DiTerlizzi, Angela, DiTerlizzi, Tony: 9780063206670: Amazon.com: Books

     Once I returned home, I was able to devote more time to the book and its contents. On the front flap of the dust jacket, I discovered that A Very Cranky Book is appropriate for children four to eight years old. With this information, I checked with our textbook to see if this story contained any elements that would appeal to this age group. Although this is not a fairy tale or folktale that this older age group prefers, I do believe it contains some appealing characteristics of the fairy tale and folktales such as animism and egocentrism (Greene & Del Negro, 2010). I also pondered a little more about the logistics of holding the book and using props at the same time. I finally came to the conclusion that would not be possible to do both. Because the assignment required the use of props, I knew that I would have to eliminate holding the book. I then read and reread the story many times to become very familiar with it. I also wrote out all of the text on notebook paper since this is my most successful learning method. 

     After saying the text out loud many times and practicing with different voices for the different characters, I wanted to prepare for the recording of my storytelling. For the props preparation, I added hand-drawn eyes and mouth to the main character (a blue book) and created a sign and character portrait that I wanted to include in the telling of the story. 

Vanket (2020) states "using puppets, props, and art/drawing also makes storytelling sessions more enthralling" (p. 55). From the comments made by my classmates and my professor about my first storytelling experience, I knew that I needed to improve the quality of the recording, especially in reference to the lighting. I wanted to record during the day and use a better recording device than the camera on my laptop. For a better piece of equipment, I used a high-quality video camera from my husband's office - a Dell Peripheral Manager - that I could use with my laptop. I also wanted to follow my professor's advice of providing information about the author and illustrator to catch my listener's attention. I researched Angela and Tony DeTerIizzi online and discovered that at first, Angela did not want to have her husband Tony be the illustrator for this book since his style of art was different than what she had in mind for the book (Publishers Weekly, 2023). I hoped that my audience would find this humorous and interesting too. In my introduction, I also chose to tell the setting of the book so that the listeners could better understand the context of the story and learn about a literary element at the same time (Cherry-Cruz, 2001). To further their interest and anticipation, I asked the audience a question for the hook - if the main character would feel cranky throughout the entire story. 

     I decided to record this activity in my bedroom since it was farther away from outside and inside noise, and it had an armoire upon which I could set the video camera attached to my laptop. I then covered a table with a white sheet to clearly display my props, pulled a chair behind the table for my seat, and brought a smaller table over where I could put my props out of view during parts of the story. I was finally ready to start recording. Wow! If I thought recording the first storytelling experience was lengthy, I was in for a shock with trying to record my storytelling experience using props. I cannot even begin to tell you how many attempts I made at recording this activity. There were problems with the zoom in the video camera, the sound of my voice, the positioning of the props, the sequencing of the story, the lighting, the interruptions by my cats, my lack of enthusiasm (Marcus, 2002), the synchronization of voice and video, and the visibility of my sign and portrait. Whew! I had a lot of problems, but I was able to rectify almost all of them. I must admit that I had to hang the papers with the text I copied from the book to use as a reference for the story sequence within my view. I also had to redo the sign and portrait of the main character using markers instead of crayons so that they were more visible in the video. I finally decided upon the best attempt out of many to submit for my storytelling with props assignment. It was then time to anxiously wait for comments from my classmates. 

     Upon my assignment submission, I let a few days pass before I rewatched it. I just needed time to step away from the process and to be more objective. For the positives, I found that I did provide a much better introduction in this storytelling activity than in the first one by providing a hook and information about the author and illustrator. I also thought that the pause was appropriate at the end of the recording when I asked the listeners about the hook. I felt that it was not too long and not too short and that I gave them time to process the answer to the hook's question. In the first storytelling activity, I had difficulty with the timing of my pauses. For the negatives, I struggled at times with the manipulation of the props (books) and even knocked over some of them. I still felt that the sound and video were not always in sync. Also, I believe that I could do better with eye contact and voice manipulation. It is certain that there are definitely things that I need to improve upon. After reading the comments from a classmate, I felt a little better about my storytelling. She liked how the simplicity of the video's setting helped the audience better focus on me and the props. I was flattered when she said that I used a clear voice and appropriate tone. I am still holding my breath a bit awaiting the grade I earned on this assignment and my professor's critique. I do know one thing for certain. For the free choice storytelling assignment, I will NOT be incorporating props. It was as difficult as I thought it would be and then some.

References

Cherry-Cruz, T. (2001). Tell me a story!. The ASHA Leader (6) 23, 4-5, 18. https://doi.org/10.1044/leader.FTRI, 0623200014

DiTerlizzi, A. (2023). A very cranky book. Quill Tree Books.

Greene, E. & Del Negro, J. M. (2010). Storytelling: Art and technique (4th ed.). Libraries United.

Marcus, I. (2002). Using storytime to teach information skills. Library Talk, September/October, 12-14.

Publishers Weekly. (2023). In Conversation: Angela and Tony DiTerlizzi. https://www.publishersweekely.com/pw/by-topic/childrens/childrens-authors/article/93158-in-conversation-angela-and-tony-diterlizzi.html

Scholastic. (2023). https://shop.scholastic.com/parent/ecommerce/books/rice-in-the-pot-goes-round-and-round-9781338621198.html

Shang, W. L. (2021). The rice in the pot goes round and round. Orchard Books.

Venkat, S. (2020). Using oral storytelling techniques in reading sessions. Knowledge Quest, 48 (5), 54-56.

 

Myths I have read:

 Dreise, G. (2018). Mad magpie. Magabala Books Aboriginal Corporation.

Napoli, D. J. (2015). Idunn’s apples. Treasury of Norse mythology (pp. 103-111). National Geographic Society.

Chiphe, E. H. (2018). When love walked the Earth: An African myth retold. Eva Harley Chiphe.

Wilkinson, P. (2019). Maui’s feats. Myths, legends & sacred stories: a visual encyclopedia (pp. 229). DK Publishing.

Punter, R. (2011). The wooden horse. Usborne Publishing Ltd.

Wilkinson, P. (2019). The good deeds of Okuninushi. Myths, legends & sacred stories: a visual encyclopedia (pp. 145). DK Publishing.

Tonatiuh, D. (2020). Feathered serpent and the five suns: A Mesoamerican creation. Harry N. Abrams.