Benefits of kids telling their own stories?

How many times do you create stories with your kids? Or letting your kids tell you stories?
When we think about story time, we often think about the physical act of reading out a pre-written story.

Rarely do we have kids using their imagination and creativity to tell their own stories.
Let’s explore the benefits of story creation for kids

• Stimulate creative thinking

A kid’s imagination knows no boundaries especially when they are given the opportunity to create stories.
That is where a child thinks of a plot, the characters next course of action and of course the storyline too.

Depending on their age, the stories that they can think of may seem like it is a little bit confusing, but this is the beauty of a child’s mind – their imagination has no boundaries!

Imagination is limitless. Its power allows you to open a window into the world of unknown

Kids can dream of having super powers that give them the ability to do things that they may wish to do… sometimes their stories are pretty simple, and they can be the main protagonist of it.

With the power to dream, kids can do anything. 

Their stories can be based on anything and everything… for example: an event happens during the day, or something out of their imagination that nobody tells them before.
Once the gate to creativity opens, it is unstoppable.

If your kids have some difficulties at the beginning when creating stories, help them.
Start with a sentence, and then let them continue with the story.
Or imagine an event that happens somewhere and say it out loud…and then let them figure out what will happen next!

Encouraging imagination with kids telling their own stories can help open their minds.

• Develop language skills

Stories are not just made for imagination and creativity!

Telling stories helps a child develop language and vocabulary as well.
It helps kids to enjoy playing with words, languages and also reading.

When we tell stories, we use words to express how and what the character may feel.
This encourages the kids to express themself in the future.
They also learn how to describe and the scenarios that they come up with  would help them to learn new words as we interact with them.

• Learn how to organise thought when telling stories

The more they practise and the more they explore words, the more confident they will be able in organising their thoughts into sentences
As we know, the basis of a conventional storyline has a beginning, a middle and an end (more on this in our future post!)

• Kids can learn presentation skills 

Practising storytelling out loud builds self confidence, so it is better to get them to practise this habit at an early age when a child’s mind absorbs information easier.
By learning how to put their thoughts together, telling a story can help boost your kids’ self esteem.
This will ease their communication and interaction with other people.
You can start playing with them, and help them bring their stories to life with body language, or by narrating the story in a different tone of voice.

The art of storytelling is being able to maintain audience interest.
And the best way to learn is by practising.

• Stories help us solve problems and try different solutions.

Stories also help us solve problems by providing opportunities to try out different actions that might lead to different outcomes.
This is especially true if another person is helping to co-create the story.

When someone is creating a story with us, he or she might suggests a different action than what we would probably have in mind.
What will be the outcome of the story with this new twist? What might I learn from their suggestion or solution? We can often work through a problem or situation by writing about it or creating a story.

Why create stories?

Because we believe that this is one of the most important life skills.
During the course of our life,  we are constantly telling stories.
Speaking and listening are as important as learning about writing and reading.
Our brain stores information through stories. 

When children create and tell a story, the information is fixed in a context.
It is now theirs.

Why am I doing this?

Children’s ability to think and understand experiences is developed by listening and speaking.
As a child’s language becomes more complex, so does their ability to understand more complex thoughts and ideas. 

The family is the child’s first source of language and learning, and there are lots of everyday activities that occur at home, which can help their language skills.
Your child will get better at using words when they practise speaking and listening to the sounds of words.

Kidcrea Story helps in getting the young ones ready to create, as we offer possibilities for children to choose and to see different problems and solutions as they change elements of a story or a character’s emotion.
A full process to help in the future your child to create on their own.

So start early and start today!