How Story and Drama Can Help Your Child
Stories are not just for reading from books. Bringing them to life through performance will help your child develop all kinds of lasting life skills:

Identity
Once upon a time, a story made a difference to your life. Stories matter throughout our lives, but they are especially important in childhood. They help us to discover what we care about and who we are. Seeing professional storytellers at work, and performing stories themselves, does an enormous amount to help children develop their sense of who they are.

Self Expression
By watching and listening to storytelling, and by participating in interactive sessions, children learn how to express their own responses and feelings, not only through language and voice projection but also through movement and gesture. When music is added, their sense of pitch and rhythm, present in language but heightened in music, is further advanced.

Comprehension
Understanding comes to children at different stages and in different ways; with storytelling in performance, they are able to follow and learn not only through what they hear but also through what they sense and observe.

Relationship
Interactive storytelling is about relationship building; children learn when to respond, and how to interact with others. Their social skills develop in leaps and bounds.

Emotional Development
The rich variety of themes and characters in storytelling creates a safe space in which children can explore a wide range of emotions and feelings, without fear of criticism or judgement.

Self Confidence
By giving children the opportunity to participate in interactive storytelling, you will boost their confidence in all kinds of ways, empowering them to realize that they can do this too and be heard!


How Storytelling Enriches
Children (PDF format)