Types of Stories to Tell: A Rainbow of Choices
Humans are storytelling creatures. We have been telling stories for time immemorial. Joseph Gottschall even argues that story is as vital for humans as water is vital for fish (1). As all-encompassing as story is, we often overlook or miss the stories that are available to us to tell our children. To see the vastness at our disposal, it is helpful to break down the universe of story into smaller categories.
Just as is used in library categorization, Story can be separated into two major categories: Non-fiction and Fiction. These first two categories are fairly self-explanatory. Non-fiction stories are about all the events that have occurred in real life, such as nature stories, history, family history, and personal stories. Fiction covers all stories that are imagined and created, be it fairy tales, novels, myths, folklore, etc.
A brief disclaimer on these categorizations is that stories like to morph and change. They often do not fit nicely into our little boxes. Some stories are much like the platypus, they bear many characteristics of multiple categories, and it is hard to know how to classify them. We acknowledge that some stories fit into more than one category and could even belong to the world of both fiction and non-fiction at the same time.
Non-fiction
The reason we tell non-fiction stories to our children is to ground them in a knowledge of who they are and where they fit into the bigger world. These stories help create the child’s identity and give them a deeper connection with their family, with those who lived before, and with the world around them. They can serve as a guide for the listener, teach moral values, and set norms for a community.
Self Stories
The first subcategory in non-fiction is the self-story. These are stories about the listener, who for our purposes, we assume is a child. They could be stories about the child’s birth or adoption, what they were like as babies, or silly things they did that made you laugh.
Family Stories
Family stories are the narratives we tell about anyone and everyone related to the child. These can be stories that the child has an intimate knowledge of because they were there, they can be stories of relatives long gone that have been passed down for generations, or somewhere in between. An Emory University study about family storytelling found that “Family stories provide a sense of identity through time, and help children understand who they are in the world."
Researchers found that children displayed higher self-esteem, lower levels of anxiety or nervousness, had fewer behavior problems, and could deal with stress more effectively when parents frequently shared family stories. (2) Telling stories about the younger days of you or your parents is a great place to start. As your child grows, they might discover that these family stories help them in difficult situations or give them a better understanding of their family dynamics.
Social Stories
Even during childhood, kids encounter and are asked to navigate an abundance of social situations. At some point, all children will likely face a challenge related to peer interactions or find a life activity, like going to the dentist for the first time, that scares them.
Social stories can help kids prepare for or process these events by walking through a hypothetical narrative about the situation. Social stories usually cover the events that did or may happen and the emotions associated with them. Social stories can be told using the child listening as the maincharacter or a different character serving as a proxy.
Community Stories
These are stories that are shared by a community. Community Stories include those of one’s religion, country, state, town, schools, clubs, etc. Community Stories bind a common group together and are often told to teach the morals and values of that community. They can help to inspire loyalty and connections with those outside of the child’s family. Like family stories, community stories ground the child in his or her world and give them a sense of belonging.
History Stories
According to Google, the word story is a Middle English shortening of the word history. The Oxford English Dictionary definition of the word story is “A narrative of imaginary or (less commonly) real events composed for the entertainment of the listener or reader; a (short) work of fiction; a tale.” (3) History is filled with stories (obviously, it’s right there in the name—history). History stories can be further broken down into biographies, historical events, and scripture/religious texts. These sub-segmentations are meant to merely help guide us in thinking about stories and how we can best tell them.
Nature Stories
Our last non-fiction category is the nature story. These stories teach about the natural world around us. They are stories that might teach about the water cycle by personifying a droplet of water, or by giving a frog a name and teaching about its life cycle. They are only fictionalized as far as giving the frog or water droplet (for example) a name and personality. Otherwise, they are factually accurate. An example of nature stories is found in some of Eric Carle’s books. The Very Hungry Caterpillar or The Very Busy Spider are good examples of nature stories that are a bit fictionalized, but otherwise factually accurate.
Fiction
Now we come to the second half of our major division of stories—the Fiction story. Fiction includes stories that are imagined, “made up,” or created. It is the source material for many of our favorite books, movies, and television shows. These stories are often the first thing that comes to mind when we hear the words, “Tell me a story.” And for good reason too. These are the stories that allow us and our listeners to experience a world of adventure, romance, and discovery without ever having to leave our own homes. We then propose dividing fiction into three more categories for the purpose of family-based storytelling —fictional stories originating from folklore, those coming from literature, and inspired stories that we newly create.
Stories from Folklore
In the German language, there is a useful way of distinguishing stories that originate collectively from a people group over time (Volksmärchen) versus those that are original pieces of art by a specific person (Kunstmärchen). Here we are referring to folklore, the Volksmärchen.
Folklore is one of our favorite places to look for narrative play inspiration. The stories are simple and easy to retell or be inspired by and adapt. If you are not yet confident in creating your own tales, begin by simply retelling these narratives that have stood the test of time. We think every child should eventually hear handed-down stories like “The Three Little Pigs,” “Little Red Riding Hood,” and “The Little Red Hen” to help root them in story tradition.
Sharing these and other fairy tales serves to deepen the child’s appreciation of more complex stories as they grow. As Sara Cone Bryant says "...to omit it [the fairy story] is to deprive him [the child] of one important element in the full appreciation of mature literature." (4)
Stories From Literature
This category is a big one, it is Kunstmärchen, and contains all of the imagined tales ever made into script-based works of art with an attributable creator. They are the novels, movies, plays, and shows that form much of what we know as culture.
We are avid readers. Dipping into this category allows us to share stories with our kids that we find interesting, but that they may not be ready to listen to yet in totality, either because of length or content. Because we are using it in a storytelling form, we can edit out the parts that might not be appropriate for them.
Just be careful, works of literature and screenplays are usually more complex than folklore. When trying to retell them, you can easily get bogged down in the details. To avoid this, we recommend using these stories as inspiration. Try retelling a single event or small series of events from your favorite novel. Or you can borrow the work’s main character, setting, or source of conflict to weave into a new story.
Inspired Stories
This leads us to our final category, the original tale, or as we call it the inspired story. This category includes the stories that you make up. They are your original creations, told at a specific time and place to a specific audience.
These tales can be told by just one person or told in collaboration with the listeners. Stories told in collaboration are when the teller takes suggestions from the listener and weaves them into the story. Inspired tales can take the form of a one-time story, a short series of stories, and never-ending tales where the story picks up day after day. As the category title suggests inspired stories are inspired by just about anything, including people, events, toys, and other stories.
We hope that by taking a deeper look into all of the story types you have available, we have inspired you to give storytelling a try.
Whether they be non-fiction or fiction, inspired or existing tales, or a mix of them all, remember that the time shared and the interaction of the teller and the listener are ultimately more important than achieving perfection in the storytelling. When you enjoy your tale, they will too. As Bryant says, "When you make a story your own and tell it, the listener gets the story, plus your appreciation of it. It comes to him filtered through your own enjoyment."(4) And thus, The Legendary Connection is made.
References:
Gottschall, J. (2013). The storytelling animal: how stories make us human. Mariner Books
Wallace, K. (2015). Your ancestor owned slaves? Don’t run from it; Tell the kids. CNN
“Story - Quick Search Results | Oxford English Dictionary.” Oed.com, 2023, www.oed.com/search/dictionary/?scope=Entries&q=story.
Bryant, S.C. (1918). How to tell stories to children and some stories to tell.
