Teaching and the Power of Story
If stories engage people so much, then why is school so often devoid of them? There’s not a whole lot of suspense in sitting, getting information, memorizing it, regurgitating it on a test, and then moving on to a new set of information. I mean, some students can find this suspenseful, as grades might matter to them and so they’ll invest in the class and put in the necessary work to reach the climax and get that desired grade. But many, MANY students are not motivated by that grade. There’s no story there. And that’s why many kids jump through just enough hoops to get by.
And as a result, so much of that important knowledge and information is not remembered and retained. It’s discarded. Which brings us back to stories. Stories have this ability to make information stick. To last permanently. There’s even compelling neuroscience that proves this. So as educators, we have to find ways to take advantage of the power of story. This means telling stories instead of just telling information, but also means creating stories within your classroom, so that when students look back on time in class, they remember it as a story with real conflict, real suspense, solving problems that actually mattered to them. You can call it project-based learning, problem based learning, inquiry-based learning, whatever, what's important is that learning is authentic and students face real challenges in the midst of content work.