At Novel Effect, we are true believers in the power of storytelling! You can use it in any classroom subjects, from English Language Arts to STEAM! Through the power of storytelling, you can change the way students absorb information and their retention of the material, no matter the subject.
The power of storytelling is backed by psychological studies that show stories have a positive impact on the hormones that make us happy. These hormones include dopamine, cortisol, and oxytocin. As we’re told a story, our brain syncs up with the speaker’s brain. This allows our brain to recreate the experience in our own mind.
As our brain mirrors the experience of the storyteller, seven different sections of the brain are activated:
These areas control your brain’s understanding of colors, shapes, sounds, scents, movement, and language. Compare that to your brain on just facts and statistics. During a story that simply shares data, there are only two sections of your brain triggered:
These two sections of the brain are associated with our ability to understand and process language. By only sharing facts,the sections of your brain associated with colors, shapes, movement, sounds, and scents are left unstimulated. It loses its ability to paint a picture and create a memory around the information being shared.
Storytelling is clearly a powerful teaching tool, especially when you want your students to retain information shared with them throughout the day. Novel Effect is a fantastic app to pair alongside read-alouds, but we don’t work with every storytelling opportunity imaginable–yet. That’s why our team sat down with a storytelling expert to learn how to transform facts into fascinating stories. Below you’ll find what we’ve learned as well as a free printable template, perfect for building out any story!
We had the amazing opportunity to sit down with Educational Consultant, LeeAnne Lavender, and learn about a six-step outline that can turn data and facts into a story. LeeAnne’s process is inspired by the hero’s journey, a storytelling template used for centuries by authors around the world. Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Harry Potter are a few examples of the hero’s journey you may recognize.
By using these six steps to create an outline for sharing information in your classroom, you can transform any lesson into a captivating story that will hold your students attention. This template is perfect for outlining classroom stories in History, English, Math–any subject you want! We’ll use the story of Sir Issac Newton’s discovery of gravity as an example of how to use storytelling during a STEAM lessons!
Example: The story of Sir Issac Newton discovering gravity.
Example: Sir Issac Newton is the hero of this story!
Your main character needs a conflict. What problem are they overcoming? What’s their biggest pain point?
Example: Sir Issac Newton is trying to determine how an apple fell from a tree and consequently hit him on the head. What caused the apple to hit him instead of float off into space?
Example: Newton realized that something caused the apple to fall from the tree and hit his head. After a lot of research, he determined the reason to be gravity, a force that keeps objects, like people (and apples), on Earth.
Example: By discovering gravity, Sir Issac Newton came to realize that Earth wasn’t the center of the solar system. This led to scientists discovering that Earth and the other planets in our solar system orbit around the Sun!
Example: Sir Isacc Newton was excited, proud, and happy when he figured out what caused the apple to fall from the tree.
Using storytelling strategies and tools throughout your students’ day is a great way to improve their retention of information and facts. By engaging the entire brain and painting a picture in their minds with stories, students will remember more from the lessons you teach.
Include a Novel Effect read-aloud in your lesson to strengthen your students’ abilities to recall important facts from your lessons by creating a mental movie in their heads!
Take our Sir Issac Newton example from above. Once you’ve shared Sir Issac’s story with the class, you can continue that lesson with a Novel Effect read-aloud of Science Starters: Gravity, an enjoyable nonfiction read about how gravity works!
Through music, sound effects, and voiceover, Novel Effect soundscapes help students visualize abstract concepts, like gravity. Here are some examples of how our Science Starters: Gravity soundscape does this:
By pairing Novel Effect’s nonfiction titles with your own storytelling strategies, you can take the power of storytelling to the next level!
Explore all of our nonfiction titles the next time you’re in the Novel Effect app by tapping the browse tab of your Novel Effect app. You can also tap the ‘Nonfiction’ quick search button or type to search by topics, keywords, authors, or genres then use the ‘Nonfiction’ filter.
While the hero’s journey story template is a great strategy to use while teaching in the classroom, it is also a great tool to use when sharing stories at staff or PTO meetings. You can even use it to share about Novel Effect’s impact on your students!
Spreading the word about how Novel Effect is changing your student’s engagement levels, their information retention, and their excitement to learn can be easy when you give this outline a try. For more great resources to help spread the magic of Novel Effect, check out our Read-Aloud Rockstar Resources.
Download the Novel Effect app to bring stories to life with music and sound that respond to your voice.
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