Ressources

StoryTeller StoryTeacher

StoryTeller StoryTeacher: Discovering the Power of Storytelling for Teaching and Living by Marni Gillard. York, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers, 1996. ISBN 1-57110-014-8 $24.95 214 P

StoryTeller is a very personal book, full of Gillard's life experiences as well as her storytelling experience with children of all ages, teachers, senior citizens, and prison inmates. It begins with a look at the importance of storytelling, covers story selection, learning to listen (to self and story), rehearsing, personal stories,coaching, poetry. The list makes it sound like many other books on storytelling, but it is not.

It is more of a “how” than a “how-to" book. Gillard takes you on a journey which traces how she re-discovered telling, and how she used it with middle-school students. Always she stresses the need to let the students tell their own stories, to praise their efforts, and to put the control for growth and change in their hands. In doing this she takes the reader into his/her own memories and makes it clear that our practices, beliefs and learning grow out of our stories. We all have a creative self, she says and we must claim our artistry.

The author's voice is clear and present throughout making this a highly readable book. It is one I will re-read, discovering more each time .Educators should enjoy, learn from, and be inspired by StoryTeller. In Canada the book is distributed by Pembroke Publishers, 538 Hood Road, Markham, ON L3R 3K9.

The Second Story Review, Vol 1, No. 1, March 1996
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