Use of Story-Telling for Effective Teaching-Learning

Dr. Prashant Pawar (pawarpm@sveri.ac.in), (Dean Academics, SVERI’s College of Engineering, Pandharpur)

With advancement in technology and continuous availability of content through the internet, students find it difficult to pay attention in the classes. Therefore, there is a need for teachers to make their teaching-learning processes effective and creative to hook the students with their lectures. One of the important techniques that good teachers have been using is the Story-telling technique. This technique is not only important for the lower level classes but can be useful for higher level education, for creating interest in difficult courses and concepts. 

The storytelling becomes effective due to its traditional roots of storytelling culture and brains automatically create interest when we convert something in the form of a story. Though the stories are being repeated, storytellers personalize it which helps in teaching infinite number of lessons along with the main moral of the story. 

Important Pointers While Creating Story of Your Concept:

1. Visualizing Objects or Using Objects: For holding the attention and linking the concepts, the storyteller has to link the concepts with some kind of objects either physical objects or by creating sketches or by visualizing. For the audience, the characters or objects of the story are easy to remember for a longer time and so the concepts taught using these objects. 
2. Asking Combing/hooking Questions: Storytellers should keep on asking combing questions towards the climax of the story about “What will happen next?”  or “What the particular character may be thinking in such a situation?” or “What could you have done in such circumstances?” or “Why did the character make such a decision?”…etc. The aim of this exercise is to increase inquisitiveness and imagination power amongst the students. No answer is right or wrong but could have multiple answers and students may surprise you sometimes by giving answers beyond your imagination. By involving students in the storytelling exercise, you help them improve their creative abilities and make the concepts easier to remember for a longer period. 
3. Connecting the Audience through Eye contacts: By creating objects and characters and asking questions to the students, the storyteller hooks them to the story and by maintaining eye contacts, the teacher makes them feel that they are part of the story. Through eye contacts, the story tellers also get visual cues about the level of understanding of students so as to customize the story or lecture accordingly.   
4. Voice Modulation and Story Enacting: The characters and situation visualization can be created using voice modulation. The voice modulation removes boredom from the concept and also makes the students laugh which relaxes them and helps in remembering the concepts. Sometimes enacting the story by involving the students helps them get more involved and also as the characters of the story are from their class, they will remember the story for their whole life and hence the concepts. 

Some of the examples of Storytelling have been given below:

1. GAJ and GAJ-GAMINI story to explain the Concept of FORCE and STRESS: In Hindi GAJ means Elephant and GAJ-GAMINI means a woman. Story starts with the question “Under whose foot do you think there will be more Stress?” GAJ? Or GAJ-GAMINI? By looking at the typical weight of Elephant (GAJ) which is about 5400kg and a typical woman (GAJ-GAMINI) is 60Kg, students are bound to answer that under the foot of Elephant. But then the story continues as 5400kg (weight)/ 4 (Legs), Weight per leg comes to be around 1350kg. Typical diameter of the Elephant’s foot is 50cm. Stress is FORCE/AREA therefore 1350 502/4 = 1350kg1962 cm2 = 0.69 Kg/cm2. On the other hand, in case of   a woman (GAJ-GAMINI), 60Kg weight gets divided on two legs at 30kg each and on heel it will be 15kg. The diameter of a typical heel is about 1cm which results into stress as 15kg/ (pi*1^2/4) = /0.785^2=19Kg/Cm^2 which is more than 25 times the stress under the foot of GAJ. So the moral of the story is it is not important how much force is applied but it is also important on amount of area it is applied.  

• Cutting of Apple with a knife to explain the concept of Strength and Failure material: When we can cut the apple, the stress on the apple is more than the strength of the apple. Strength of the given apple is constant and the stress (Force/ Cross sectional area) on the apple can be increased by either increasing force or reducing the cross sectional area. The cross sectional area of knives coming in contact with apple can be reduced by making knife sharper.  

• Story of various types of Chair to explain Concept of Dynamics: As a teacher, I started telling that I had a plastic chair which had rigid support. One day, I was in a good mood and I jumped on that chair and got a big hit. This was because the legs of the chair were rigid and Newton’s third law became applicable by giving equal and opposite force. So, I told this problem to my research students. They gave a thought of reducing my pain by installing chair with spring. Then I jumped on the chair and started jumping continuously and it was unforgettable, then they thought of replacing the chair with a damper. First time, I jumped I enjoyed all the shock that was absorbed by the damper but the second time, when I jumped when the damper was closed, I got the same shock as the rigid chair.  Then every time when I wanted to use the chair someone had to lift the chair to bring the damper in an open position. Then my students studied a lot and they realized that damper is to release the force but spring is required for restoring the position and that’s how for reducing vibration, we need chairs with spring and damper combination.  This story helps students to remember the concept of spring mass damper based concept of equation of motion of dynamics. 

Please see the video of the demo of these stories in the video link given in reference 4 below.

References: 

1. http://teachersofindia.org/en/article/storytelling-strategies
2. https://www.canva.com/learn/advertisement-design-tips/
3. https://www.pdfdrive.com/story-physics-harnessing-the-underlying-forces-of-storytelling-d183865606.html
4. https://www.facebook.com/pawarpm/videos/vb.100000352402262/2744561885565531/?type=3