WORTH WHILE STORIES FOR EVERY DAY

ARRANGED, COMPILED, AND EDITED
BY

LAWTON B. EVANS, A.M.

WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF THE TEACHERS OF THE
PRIMARY GRADES OF THE PUBLIC
SCHOOLS OF AUGUSTA, GA.

1923
MILTON BRADLEY COMPANY
SPRINGFIELD, MASS.

Copyright, 1917,
By MILTON BRADLEY COMPANY,
Springfield, Mass.

Bradley Quality Books

Printed in the United States of America

A WORD TO STORY TELLERS

In order to make story-telling most effective, the story-teller should bear in mind certain conditions that are imposed by those who listen.

1. Know the story. Know it well enough to tell it in your own language, and in the language of the children who hear it. Know it well enough to amplify, vary, improve, make all kinds of excursions and side incidents, and yet return easily to the main body of the story.

2. Tell the story. Do not read it. The speaker is free and unbound by book or words; the reader is held by the formal page before him. The stories in this book are condensed, too condensed for reading and need the addition of words to make them of the right consistency. Those words should be the narrator’s own; the story then becomes the narrator’s story and not the author’s, and that is as it should be.

3. Act the story. Do not be afraid of the dramatic side of narration. Imitate all the sounds that belong to the story, such as the winds blowing, the thunder rolling, a bear growling, a dog barking, etc. Change your voice to meet the requirements of youth and age. Throw yourself heart and soul into the spirit of the narrative and do not be afraid to take all the parts, and to act each one in turn.

4. Impress the story. Remember that the story is the main thing and that the moral point is secondary. Do not make the story a sermon, and do not dwell severely upon its ethical features. If the story is amusing let it be without moral value. If it is historical let it remain so. Generally speaking you can bring out the moral features in a few words at the close. Children do not like too much sermonizing.

5. Use the story. If the story lends itself to dramatization, by all means let the children act the parts; if it is a good language exercise, let them tell it or write it in their own words; if it can be illustrated let them draw pictures on the board or at their seats; if it can be used for handwork in any way, let them make what they can.

6. Enjoy the story. Make it worth while for pupils to be punctual in order to hear the story; recur often to past stories when occasion recalls them to mind; let the imagination play around all the incidents so that the mind will be filled with those images that have been the joy of childhood since the world began.

Augusta. Ga.Lawton B. Evans.

CONTENTS