Story Vine
Definition and Purpose
Story vines are a way to make storytelling come alive and to put fun into storytelling, retelling, and oral sharing and presenting. Story vines enhance reading, writing, listening, speaking, representing and viewing. These are all of the language skills that teachers strive to develop in children. Story telling can help to develop students to develop a better understanding about themselves and the world around them. Story telling can also increase self-esteem and poise when students are required to speak in front of an audience.
A story vine is visually displayed through representation on a braided vine or rope. Representations may include objects, pictures, drawings, or any other visual portrayal that can be imagined. A series of representations or prompts are placed along the vine and used as a set of reminders for the storyteller to tell the story in order, using the main characters, the main events, and the setting. These representations help the storyteller to dramatize and remember the story.
There are multiple benefits associated with the use of story vines. The process of creating a story vine will help children develop a sense of story and story structure, comprehension skills, fluency in storytelling, oral language and memory skills as well as confidence in their ability to tell stories and speak in front of an audience.
Steps
The process of creating a story vine from start to finish has four stages: A. Modeling, B. Planning and Preparing, C. Creating the story vine and D. Presenting and Sharing.
A: Modeling
1. The very first step is for the teacher to model what storytelling looks, sounds and feels like when using a story vine. This first step is critical in engaging the students.
2. Teachers discuss the art of storytelling with their students. They can discuss how the use of representations or prompts can assist both the storyteller and the audience.
3. Teachers model the story structure by creating a storyboard on a story that has been shared with the students. Teachers will develop this storyboard collaboratively with the students. The storyboard will help the students decide which parts of the story are the most important and which representations will go on their story vine.
B: Planning and Preparing
1. Teachers will determine a genre to study and share orally with their students. It is important to read some books aloud to the students to allow them to hear how expression, intonation and pauses are effectively used in telling a story.
2. Provide opportunities for children to read the books individually or in pairs and to choose a story that they wish to share orally.
C: Creating the Story Vine
1. Teachers set criteria for the retelling of the story, including the length, and the number of prompts to include.
2. Students create a storyboard for their chosen story and choose prompts to attach to the story vine.
3. Students braid the material selected to create the vine and properly place and attach their prompts.
D: Presenting and Sharing
1. Students will spend time rehearsing their stories, carefully selecting their words, using voices for characters and using appropriate expression, volume and intonation.
2. Students will present story vines to each other, to other classes, to parents or to community members.
3. Display the story vines in the classroom.
Application and Examples