Bongiorno_Cameron_Blogshare Post
Hello again! For this post, I will share what I discovered on a blog that features storytelling. In order to locate such a blog, I first looked through the blog sites that our professor had provided in the Resources section on Blackboard. Although these sites are interesting, they are different from what I had in mind. I wanted to find a blog that includes information about storytelling and tips for storytelling, especially in regard to doing so with older children and teens. I find working with teens and young adults very interesting, and I would like to work in a public school library at the secondary level. After searching on Google for a blog with these requirements, I finally settled on the blog titled Storytelling Notes by Priscilla Howe. This blog is part of her personal website https://www.priscillahowe.com (Howe, 2023). After looking at her website, its various tabs, and her blog, I determined that this is a storyteller that I wanted to learn more about and learn from.
Through my perusal of her website (Howe, 2023), specifically under the tab titled "About", I discovered that Priscilla Howe is a professional storyteller who does not include costumes, props, or a script in her performances. She does use puppets, however, when she performs for younger students. (In my mind, puppets are props, but I do not believe Ms. Howe follows my line of thinking about this.) With a Master's degree in Library Service, she worked at the University of Kansas as a Slavic cataloger. (She lived in Belgium for a year during high school and one year in Bulgaria.) She then served as a children's librarian in Connecticut. In 1993, Priscilla Howe began telling stories full-time as a professional storyteller. She received the Fulbright Scholarship in 2015 which enabled her to live in Bulgaria for five months. Afterward, she wrote the book Clever, Kind, Tricky, and Sly: A Bulgarian Folktale Sampler. In addition to her website, Priscilla Howe has her own YouTube channel ((22) Priscilla Howe - YouTube). She and her cat, Pippin, currently live in Lawrence, Kansas. Howe is available to lead programs and workshops, teach classes, coach others, and conduct storytelling performances in person or online. I am truly impressed by all that she has accomplished and continues to do!
I am embarrassed to admit that prior to taking this class and reading this blog, I had not really considered storytelling as a profession. I imagined that it was a part of library programming or a fun activity people do when gathered around a fire. Was I wrong or what?! Priscilla Howe addressed storytelling as a profession in her blog. She confessed that doing so was difficult and that it was a business for her. In addition to creating, learning, and performing stories, she managed her business through marketing, creating contracts and invoices, and keeping up with income, expenses, mileage, and taxes among other things (Howe, 2017, April 14). Aside from getting paid for storytelling performances and workshops, she also earns money through paid subscriptions to her bedtime stories on Patreon (Priscilla Howe | creating silly and soothing bedtime stories | Patreon) (Howe, 2021, June 11) and tips that she receives from the patrons of her storytelling performances in her backyard (Howe, 2022, May 30). Ms. Howe also receives money in the form of tips for her online Zoom storytelling shows (Howe, 2021, March 15) and paid subscriptions to her newsletter on Substack (Howe, 2023). It seems like she is certainly one busy lady! Below is a map of all the places where she has performed.
Although it is very interesting, I think I have provided plenty about Priscilla Howe's background and storytelling business. I would now like to dive into some of the things that I learned through Howe's blogs. For example, I love how she described her preparation methods for storytelling (Howe, 2019, June 18). She will fix the story in her mind by telling it from different characters' points of view and angles, and she will create the exact details of the characters in her mind before telling the story to accurately picture them in her imagination. She also admits that she may get bored telling the same story over and over again. To help lessen the monotony, she may change the image of the characters in her mind (Howe, 2019, June 18). I also appreciated her tips when doing storytelling online with Zoom since I feel that this also applies to us as we record ourselves for this class. (Howe, 2017, December 19). Howe suggests that there are no distractions for her or her audience during storytelling, whether it be the neighbor or the cat. (So true! My cat decided to interrupt my last storytelling experience by putting herself directly in front of the camera. I had to start over from the beginning. Ugh.) She also suggests incorporating slower hand gestures or movements since faster ones can come across as blurry to the viewers. Also, dimming the brightness on the screen will help minimize the glare from her (and my) glasses (Howe, 2017, December 19). I think that these are wonderful suggestions that I will try to use while recording my upcoming storytelling experiences!
Howe (2020, November 4) included this helpful information in another post.
A few guidelines for telling stories to children, considering stages of child development:
Age 0-2: Children enjoy peekaboo, patty cake, nursery rhymes, fingerplays. Use rhyme and rhythm.
Age 2-3: Still use fingerplays, rhyme and rhythm, lots of repetition. Simple, simple stories, 5 minutes or less. When they’re done listening, they’re done.
Age 4-5: Starting to differentiate from others, to understand others’ feelings. Continue repetition, rhyme, rhythm. Go a little longer. Silliness works well. Tales about families.
Age 6-7: More aware of others, of emotions, getting an idea of morality. Better at predicting where the story goes.
Age 8-10: Able to figure out tricky stories, curious about other countries and the natural world. Now understand irony and sarcasm. May be less engaged by repetition.
Age 11-13: Go for the gore to begin with. Tell stories you would tell to adults (though not sexually explicit stories) to these kids. They can take it. (para. 5)
I found these guidelines very helpful and interesting, especially those about older kids, and believe these will be useful when doing my internship and working at a library in the future. In another post, Howe (2017, November 2) describes what to do when telling jump tales. First, the storyteller cannot tell anyone in the audience that the performance is a jump tale. It must be a total surprise to everyone listening. Then, the storyteller must slow their speech, speak quietly, and pause right before the jump. This will set the perfect scene for the jump (Howe, 2017, November 2). Although I do not plan on telling a jump tale as an upcoming storytelling experience for this course, I do think that this information will also be helpful in getting the audience's full attention and focus during any storytelling occasion.
I was so excited when I discovered one of Howe's posts that addressed telling stories to older kids, since this is the age group I hope to work with in the future. Howe (2017, February 12) does not include any puppets in her storytelling performances for adults and older kids. She tends to use more personal stories with these older listeners, tries to surprise them during storytelling, or attempts to connect with them on a more emotional level. I loved that Howe (2017, February 12) also mentions that the lack of emotion on their faces does not mean that they are bored. I would like to highlight one more post that addresses my concern about filling in free time after a storytelling or programming session. I was one of those teachers who liked to keep my students engaged until the end of class, and I feel that I will be the same in the library. I do not want to give my listeners an opportunity to get bored and misbehave. Howe (2020, November 18) provided some short and interesting activities to fill in the last little bit of time. She suggested that a storyteller should have some games, songs, and/or stretches at the ready for times such as this. She provided details about the circular story game titled "A dark and stormy night" and even provided an audio clip of this in action. In this game, the students tell the short story of "A dark and stormy night" in different voices as they sit in a circle. Howe also introduced the pass-around story game "Magic Box". In this game, she provides a small box of objects from which the students choose one trinket. They will then use the selected trinket as a part of the story they create. That person will pass the box to another student who will continue the story by including something about the new trinket they have chosen (Howe, 2020, November 18).
These are great ideas that I plan to use in the future! I have truly appreciated all of the advice that Howe has imparted through her posts. There are so many that I cannot include them all, and I hope that you have been able to take away something of interest or use from my description of the ones I highlighted. Better yet, I hope that you will visit her website which includes these and many more blog posts. Have a great week!
References
Howe, P. (2023). Priscilla Howe, storyteller: Connect, reflect, enjoy. https://www.priscillahowe.com
Howe, P. (2022, May 30). Story nights starting up in June. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2022/5/18/story-nights-starting-up-in-june
Howe, P. (2021, June 11). A year of bedtime stories. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2021/6/11/a-year-of-bedtime-stories
Howe, P. (2021, March 15). Around the world and back on Zoom. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2021/3/15/around-the-world-and-back-on-zoom
Howe, P. (2020, November 18). Story games, songs, stretches and silliness. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2020/11/18/storyl-games-songs-stretches-and-silliness
Howe, P. (2020, November 4). Storytelling for parents and grandparents. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2020/11/4/storytelling-for-parents-and-grandparents
Howe, P. (2019, June 18). Perspective and backstory. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2019/6/18/perspective-and-backstory
Howe, P. (2017, December 19). Storytelling live-ish. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2017/12/19/storytelling-live-ish
Howe, P. (2017, November 2). Advice on telling jump tales. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2017/11/2/advice-on-telling-jump-tales
Howe, P. (2017, April 14). Making a living as a storyteller. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2017/4/14/making-a-living-as-a-storyteller
Howe, P. (2017, February 12). Stories for grownups and older kids. Storytelling Notes. https://www.priscillahowe.com/blog-five/2017/2/12/stories-for-grownups-and-older-kids
Tall Tales I Have Read:
Blane, A. (2019). John Henry. Newmark Learning.
Gill, S. (2014). Prickly Rose. Charlesbridge.
Houran, L. H. (2020). The tale of Paul Bunyan. Golden Books.
Houran, L. H. (2017). My little Golden Book about Johnny Appleseed. Golden Books.
Meister, C. (2014). Davy Crockett and the great Mississippi Snag. Picture Window Books.
Strauss, K. (2012). Pecos Bill invents the ten-gallon hat. Pelican Publishing.
COLLAPSE
ReplyDeleteHi Cameron!
I love how much background information that you gave on the blogger that you chose. It was so interesting to learn about her life and I also checked out some of her Youtube videos, so I am glad that you linked her channel. She is an amazing storyteller, so I can learn a lot from her. I like that you were honest about not considering storytelling to be a profession prior to this class. I also have never thought about it as a profession but rather as part of a different one such as being a teacher or librarian. The map that you included to show where she has performed was a great addition. She has traveled so many places, that would be a dream job for me. I cannot wait to use the guidelines that she provided in her blog for my next story time and I really want to try out the "Magic Box" with my students. Thank you so much for sharing this blog and I cannot wait to follow Priscilla Howe's blog.