Speaking Oneself Into Being: Oral Storytelling as a Transformational Tool

Abstract

Student stories are a potentially transformational natural resource running through the veins of our schools, but this resource sometimes goes untapped. One strategy teachers can use to take advantage of this resource is to formally introduce oral storytelling into the classroom to explicitly teach students how to choose and craft stories from their lives and then allow them to publicly perform those stories. This chapter captures one student's journey during a 16-week oral storytelling workshop at a Title I public high school in East New York, Brooklyn. It addresses the following question: What effects do oral storytelling units have on students' understanding of themselves, on their sense of personal leadership and agency, and on their relationships with others? This chapter documents how granting students the time and space to bear witness to each other's lives and ‘go public' with stories that could otherwise go unheard may improve student agency and classroom community.