Proverbial Storytelling and Lifelong Learning in the Home-School Dialogue

Introduction

The process of dialogue brings people and ideas together to coordinate legitimate social action and generate new approaches to old issues. This chapter analyses the educational value of proverbial storytelling as a platform for home-school dialogue from a lifelong learning perspective and introduces the concepts of Cultural Catalysts and Idiolect Definition (ID) to facilitate this dialogue.

Specifically, from a lifelong learning point of view in the fast paced media and technology environment of our times, the home-school dialogue brings together and integrates:

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  The formal learning curriculum of the school with the informal learning curriculum that runs in parallel within the family and social context at large;

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  The learning and life experience of different age and socio-cultural groups (intergenerational lifelong learning, multicultural lifelong learning) within the school community and the wider local and regional community at large.

Storytelling is a ‘form of disseminating meaning across the lifespan’ (McGee, 2008:1). It offers a bridge to the past and can link modern societies with the past and with culture (UNESCO, 2009; Agelidou, 2010). It provokes an inner dialogue leading to reflection, as well as to informal learning and Baldwin and Dudding (2007) provide a reference of classroom activities using storytelling which promote

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  Wisdom by referring to principles and values that stand the test of time;

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  Development of daily life skills that promote emotional well being;

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  Imagination and inventiveness in problem solving situations;

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  Verbal skills;

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  Transfer of knowledge and skills to various aspects of life, such as workplace;

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  Discovery of uniqueness.

From a dialectic point of view this chapter introduces two concepts – cultural catalysts and idiolect definition (ID) (Theodosopoulou & Papalois, 2011). Cultural catalysts are wisdom and common sense related didactic folk products such as fairy tales, proverbs and old sayings, riddles, songs, etc. The classic didactic value of cultural catalysts usually relates to reading, writing and learning of a foreign language and is based on three characteristics:

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  Brevity, by the use of short sentences and narratives that are kept to the minimum;

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  Wit, by using quick retorts and liveliness of spirit to produce unexpected response to trivial questions and issues;

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  Rhetoric and visualization. The use of metaphors, similes, personification (e.g. the use animal characters with human like qualities in Aesop’s fables remind people the consequences of their right or wrong choices in life), rhetorical questions, dialogue etc.