Jumpstart! Storymaking: Games and Activities for Ages 7-12

137 Pages·2009·1.54 MB·English

by  Pie Corbett

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JUMPSTART!
STORYMAKING
3343 T&F Jumpstart Storymaking:01 Section JN 3/11/08 11:03 Page ii
TheJumpstart!bookscontain‘quick-fire’ideasthatcouldbe
usedaswarm-upsandstartersaswellaspossiblyextended
intolessons.Therearemorethan100provocativegamesand
activitiesforKeyStage1,2or3classrooms.Practical,easy-
to-doandvastlyentertaining,the‘jumpstarts’willappealto
busyteachersinanyprimaryorKeyStage3classroom.
Alsoavailableintheseries:
Jumpstart!Literacy
GamesandActivitiesforAges7–14
978-1-84312-102-2
PieCorbett
Jumpstart!Poetry
GamesandActivitiesforAges7–12
978-0-415-46708-7
PieCorbett
Jumpstart!Creativity
GamesandActivitiesforAges7–14
978-0-415-43273-7
SteveBowkett
Jumpstart!ICT
ICTActivitiesandGamesforAges7–14
978-1-84312-465-8

JohnTaylor
Jumpstart!Numeracy
MathsActivitiesandGamesforAges5–14
978-1-84312-264-7
JohnTaylor
3343 T&F Jumpstart Storymaking:01 Section JN 3/11/08 11:03 Page iii
JUMPSTART!
STORYMAKING
GAMES AND ACTIVITIES FOR AGES 7–12
Pie Corbett
3343 T&F Jumpstart Storymaking:01 Section JN 3/11/08 11:03 Page iv
Firstpublished2009
byRoutledge
2ParkSquare,MiltonPark,Abingdon,Oxon,OX144RN
SimultaneouslypublishedintheUSAandCanada
byRoutledge
270IMadisonIAve,INewIYork,INYI10016
RoutledgeisanimprintoftheTaylor&FrancisGroup,aninformabusiness
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2008.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
©2009PieCorbett
Note:ITheIrightIofIPieICorbettItoIbeIidentifiedIasItheIauthorIofIthisIwork
hasbeenassertedbyhiminaccordancewiththeCopyright,Designsand
PatentsAct1988.
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereprintedorreproduced
orutilizedinanyformorbyanyelectronic,mechanical,orothermeans,
nowknownorhereafterinvented,includingphotocopyingandrecording,
orinanyinformationstorageorretrievalsystem,withoutpermissionin
writingfromthepublishers.
BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData
AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary.
LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData
Corbett,Pie.
Jumpstart!storymaking:gamesandactivitiesforages7–12/PieCorbett.
p.cm.
1.Literature–Studyandteaching(Elementary)–Activityprograms.

2.Literature–Studyandteaching(Middleschool)–Activityprograms.
I.Title.
LB1575.C672009
372.64'044–dc22
2008025170
ISBN 0-203-88603-8 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN10:0-415-46686-5(pbk)
ISBN10:0-203-88339-X(ebk)
ISBN13:978-0-415-46686-8(pbk)
ISBN13:978-0-203-88339-6(ebk)
3343 T&F Jumpstart Storymaking:01 Section JN 3/11/08 11:03 Page v
Contents
Acknowledgements vi
Bywordofmouth:thestoryofthestory vii
Introduction ix
1 Creativewarm-ups 1
2 Strengtheningtheimagination 10
3 Sentencegames 15
4 Charactergames 28
5 Gamestodevelopsettings 45
6 Storymakinggames 55
7 Twentythingstodowithastory 92
8 Storyreadingdetectives 97

9 Creatingastorymakingclimateinschoolandclassroom 102
10 Resources 115
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Acknowledgements
A few examples of children’s work in this book were first
published in My Grandmother’s Motorcyle by Pie Corbett and
BrianMoses(OxfordUniversityPress,1991).
This book is dedicated to all those teachers who keep
storytelling alive in their classrooms – especially the original
teacher-researchersontheStorymakingProject,fromwhomI
learnedsomuch.
Someoftheideasforencouragingreadingwereoriginatedby
theNationalLiteracyTrustwhichhasplayedsuchakeyrole
inpromotingreadinginschoolsandcommunities.Mythanks
to the Trust, and especially Julia Strong, for supporting
‘storymaking’ and providing me with the opportunity to
sharetheseideaswiththousandsofteachers.
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By word of mouth: the story
of the story
Once,longago,inaplacethatisneitherherenortherebutis
everywhere,therewasatimewhentroublecametotheland.
Butonemanknewwheretogointheforest.Therehelita
fire,chantedthewords,andsoitwasthatdisasterpassed.
Nowhewentandtoldthestoryinthemarketsquareabout
howdisasterhadbeendiverted,andthousandsflockedto
hear.Soitwasthatbywordofmouththestorywashanded
down.
Nowtheyearsranbytill,intheend,anotherthreatappeared;
andonemanwhohadstoodlisteninginthatsquareallthose
yearsbeforerememberedthathehadtogointotheforest,
buthewasnotsurewhere.However,helitafire,chantedthe
words,andsoitwasthatdisasterpassed.Nowhe,too,went
andtoldthestoryinthemarketsquareabouthowdisaster
hadbeendiverted,andhundredscametolisten.Soitwas
thatbywordofmouththestorywaspasseddown.
Nowtheyearsranbyuntil,intheend,anotherdisaster,
greaterth anbefore,threatenedtheworld.Andonemanwho
hadstoodlisteninginthatsquareallthoseyearsbeforedid
notknowwheretogonordidheknowwhattodo,buthe
rememberedtochantthewords,andsoitwasthatdisaster
passed.Nowhewent,too,andtoldthestoryinthemarket
placeabouthowdisasterhadbeendiverted,andafewpeople
cametowatchbutalltheothersweretoobusywiththeir
lives.Soitwasthatbywordofmouththestorywasspoken.
Nowtheyearsranbyuntilintheendtheworstofallpossible
threatsappeared.Andonemanwhosatinhishouse,
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Jumpstart!Storymaking
twitchingthecurtainsandwatchingtheworldrushby,
rememberedthatsomethingneededtobesaidanddone.But
hedidn’tknowwheretogo,andhedidn’tknowwhattodo,
andhenolongerknewthewords.Andsoitwasthatthe
worstofallpossiblethreatsvisitedtheland–forthestory
haddisappeared.Ithadshrivelledanddiedonthetonguesof
womanandmanallthoseyearsbefore.
Noonelistened.Noonespoke.Nooneknew.
Andthatiswhyweneedtolistentoourstoryasitflows
throughthecenturiesbywordofmouth.

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Introduction
There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but
therehavebeennosocietiesthatdidnottellstories.
UrsulaK.LeGuin(1979)fromTheLanguageoftheNight:
EssaysonFantasyandScienceFiction
Storymaking began as an international research project based
attheInternationalLearningandResearchCentre.Theinitial
project was co-led by Mary Rose and myself. We set out to
discover how to help children learn another language
throughstorytelling.Theideawasquitesimple:thechildren
would learn to tell a story in their own language and then
learnthesamestoryinanotherlanguage.
One of the by-products of the teacher research was that the
process improved the children’s writing. The Education
Department (then known as the DFES) then gave us money,
through the ‘Innovations Unit’, to explore ‘telling into
writing’. This helped us work with teachers to develop
storymakingacrossprimaryschools.

We taught the children stories orally, and when they knew
them really well they innovated on the story, changing them
to create something new. We also built in opportunities for
children to make up their own stories. Over the following
seven years, I gathered a range of storymaking games and
activities that help develop children as storytellers and story
writers as well as story readersand performers. Thisbook is
intended to provide a bank of story games to help children
developconfidenceandexpertiseinstorymaking.Itinvolves
storytellingbutalsoincludesstorywriting,storyreadingand
dramatising as well as a round-up of ideas for developing a
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