Time travels: Abington students learn
about Thanksgiving from storyteller
By Mikaela Slaney
Thu Nov 19, 2009, 08:50 AM EST
Abington -
Their teacher for the afternoon, storyteller, Andrea Lovett, had taken over Adrienne Whalen’s Center School 3rd grade class to teach the children about what life was like for pilgrims, in preparation for Thanksgiving on Nov. 26.
The students also spun wooden blades like helicopters into the air, and played with the well-known wooden ball-in-a-cup game.
But Lovett’s engaging program—A Journey Through Time: A Pilgrim’s Story—was not all fun and games, Lovett said. It was also a chance to learn through the art of story telling.
“I think it went very well,” Lovett said. “ when I checked in with the students, they understood the message of the story…I try to create images so they have a clear picture of where we are traveling within the story.”
Earlier in the demonstration, the children were asked to sniff a plant and guess what it could be. Lovett revealed they were mint leaves, which pilgrims used in tea to curb stomach ailments.
By playing word games with each other, Lovett tested the students’ ability to answer one popular pilgrim riddle—What is full all day and then empty at night?
After several guesses, Lovett revealed it was shoes.
“It was fun because we got to make the toys and play with some of them, and smell the plants,” said Fraser Toomey, 9. “I think pilgrim life was fun and sometimes a little bit bad because sometimes there wasn’t a lot to eat.”
Lovett said she started storytelling 17 years ago, noting she has studied the art of storytelling in classes and workshops .
“Narrative language is a natural to the brain,” Lovett said. “It makes it easy to grasp information. We think in images.”
Lovett also teaches storytelling to students at Gardner Elementary School in Allston, adding studies are being conducted in some schools on the possibility that storytelling improves MCAS literacy scores for children when used as an academic literacy tool.
She currently participates in “Story Slams,” five minute storytelling competitions in Boston, and she also co-founded massmouth.com, an Internet site focusing on storytelling.
Whalen explained that later this semester, her students will be reading historical non-fiction about young pilgrims Sarah Marten and Samuel Eaton.
They will also learn what it was like to be a child back then, through the eyes of someone their own age.
“We’re really just building background in terms of the holidays, talking about Thanksgiving and what they’re thankful for,” Whalen said.
From Nash School in Weymouth
Dear Andrea,
In a scene reminiscent of the Hogwarts School from the Harry Potter series, a cloaked woman stood at the front of the class waving a stick over her head as her students emulated her.
But the students were tying pipe cleaner loops to the reeds and making a game where they could try to catch the loop on the end of the stick.Their teacher for the afternoon, storyteller, Andrea Lovett, had taken over Adrienne Whalen’s Center School 3rd grade class to teach the children about what life was like for pilgrims, in preparation for Thanksgiving on Nov. 26.
The students also spun wooden blades like helicopters into the air, and played with the well-known wooden ball-in-a-cup game.
But Lovett’s engaging program—A Journey Through Time: A Pilgrim’s Story—was not all fun and games, Lovett said. It was also a chance to learn through the art of story telling.
“I think it went very well,” Lovett said. “ when I checked in with the students, they understood the message of the story…I try to create images so they have a clear picture of where we are traveling within the story.”
Earlier in the demonstration, the children were asked to sniff a plant and guess what it could be. Lovett revealed they were mint leaves, which pilgrims used in tea to curb stomach ailments.
By playing word games with each other, Lovett tested the students’ ability to answer one popular pilgrim riddle—What is full all day and then empty at night?
After several guesses, Lovett revealed it was shoes.
“It was fun because we got to make the toys and play with some of them, and smell the plants,” said Fraser Toomey, 9. “I think pilgrim life was fun and sometimes a little bit bad because sometimes there wasn’t a lot to eat.”
Lovett said she started storytelling 17 years ago, noting she has studied the art of storytelling in classes and workshops .
“Narrative language is a natural to the brain,” Lovett said. “It makes it easy to grasp information. We think in images.”
Lovett also teaches storytelling to students at Gardner Elementary School in Allston, adding studies are being conducted in some schools on the possibility that storytelling improves MCAS literacy scores for children when used as an academic literacy tool.
She currently participates in “Story Slams,” five minute storytelling competitions in Boston, and she also co-founded massmouth.com, an Internet site focusing on storytelling.
Whalen explained that later this semester, her students will be reading historical non-fiction about young pilgrims Sarah Marten and Samuel Eaton.
They will also learn what it was like to be a child back then, through the eyes of someone their own age.
“We’re really just building background in terms of the holidays, talking about Thanksgiving and what they’re thankful for,” Whalen said.
From Nash School in Weymouth
Dear Andrea,
The children loved the shows. Shannon's crew were talking about the nature stories as they got off the bus. You know it was a great success when they are still talking hours later!
It was great to meet you. Thank you for bringing your talent to Nash.
Michelle
(Paula Junn)
April 7, 2012
“We expect stories to be a little bit embellished, but our rule is 99 percent true,” says Andrea Lovett, a professional storyteller and founder of Massmouth, a nonprofit storytelling organization that will conclude its 2011-12 story slam season Wednesday night with the Big Mouth Off at the Coolidge Corner Theatre in Brookline. Fifteen Massachusetts-based storytellers will perform, and ticket proceeds will benefit the StoriesLive High School Scholarship Story Slam.
(Paula Junn)
Text size – +
