|
Sample Residency Program I
Suitable for 2nd-7th grades (adaptable for middle, junior and high
school)
Dragons, serpents or "wyrms" are featured in folktales
told the world over. Rising from fossil ruins and the vivid human
imagination, seasoned by cultural beliefs and superstitions, these
great beasts took on vastly different shapes and meanings in eastern
and western cultures. Starting with stories and ending with their
own artwork and acrostic poetry, students will consider a creature
of myth that is seen as bloodthirsty in Europe and auspicious in
Asia. Along the way, they’ll immerse themselves in listening and
language arts, critical thinking and creativity, and begin to examine
how its myths and metaphors reflect a culture.
Second through seventh graders are moving from a world of magical
thinking and starting to try on the real world for size. But there
is more to the real world than what is concrete or what can be seen.
With their own developing fluency as readers and writers and their
growing sense of themselves and others, students this age enjoy
fantasy stories that combine elements of adventure and danger with
ethical questions. They are readying themselves for a life quest
in which not only strength and courage but also honor and compassion
are tools needed for the journey. What better way to prepare for
that task, then to listen to the myriad tales of choice and consequence
left to us by our ancestors? After all, once upon a time is now.
This residency can be conducted as six hour-long sessions or as
two all-day immersions.
 |
Sample Residency Program II
Adaptable for elementary, middle and high school
In human development, orality precedes literacy. It follows that
the best recipe for story-making includes plenty of story-listening.
Milbre Burch can provide this opportunity in the form of a residency
entitled Talking Story. A five-day classroom primer devoted
to the telling of oral stories and the examination of story elements
(plot, character, setting, conflict, etc.), Talking Story
complements her Sand to Stories, Tableaux to Tales residency
program. It also stands alone.
In each hour long session of Talking Story, a minimum of
three folktales are selected and presented by the artist, followed
by discussion and activities with students regarding a particular
element of story structure (character, setting, plot, etc.). The
follow-up exercises in each Talking Story session are designed
to get kids "thinking on the tongue" about how oral stories
work.
By the end of a five-day Talking Story session, the students
will have heard at least fifteen folktales and participated in numerous
exercises to identify and apply elements of story structure. This
oral story primer is excellent preparation for Sand to Stories,
Tableaux to Tales. Or it can be used by itself to support the
teachers' own writing instruction.
This residency is designed as five hour-long sessions, but can
be adapted for a smaller number of longer immersion sessions.
|
Sample Residency Program III
Adaptable for elementary, middle and high school
Based on the fact that orality precedes literacy in human development,
this residency uses sand trays for group story making (and if appropriate
story writing) prompts in the classroom. First, the teller sets
a variety of evocative objects in three sand trays, suggesting the
beginning, middle and end of a story. With suggestions from the
students, she "reads" the objects from left to right,
and then again from right to left creating two distinct improvised
stories from the same set of trays. Working solo and in small groups
in the following sessions, the students develop a tableaux of objects
in the trays, "rough out" the sequence of each tale, finesse
their spoken word "drafts" and then tell it to a partner
or partners. With support from the teacher, the students can be
encouraged to continue working to document the story or stories
they have created either in pictures or in writing, or both.
This highly interactive language arts residency can be adapted for
diverse ages from pre-writers to fluent writers. In any case, it
is essential for the students to have had some introduction to story
structure. This can be accomplished by students' listening to folktales
told live (by school staff or parent volunteers or visiting artists)
or on audiotape or videotape, followed by a review of story elements
(plot, character, setting, conflict, etc.). Your school and local
library can probably suggest or provide appropriate resources for
listening as well. If the residency site prefers, Milbre Burch can
provide this service with an age-appropriate assembly program, and/or
in the form of a residency add-on entitled Talking Story
(above).
This residency can be conducted as five hour-long sessions, but
can be adapted for a smaller number of longer immersion sessions.
|
