The Importance of Stories in Education

"Keep Telling the Story" -- Hanno Fuchs

There's an interesting confluence happening in my life right now, with this notion of "storytelling" smack in the middle of it. Obviously, this blog shows a renewed interest on my part in telling stories, as do my daily "morning pages." The blog often concerns itself with stories that want to fill in the blanks -- the missing or fading pieces of my family's past. And my morning pages are usually an exercise in capturing any worthwhile stories from the day before, among anything else that crosses my mind.

The idea of "confluence" comes in because I'm seeing and hearing the word "story" more and more in the professional circles in which I work. As a kind of backlash to the "data-driven" push of the last ten years or so in public education, more and more people are calling on that other kind of data -- the anecdotal or qualitative variety.

It came up first in the book Influencer that is central to the work I'm currently doing. The book posits that stories, when told well, allow those whom you are trying to influence to take a leap of faith. Good stories let you imagine a different reality and thus make you more likely to take steps toward change.

I can buy that. It certainly seems to be true of the kind of professional development I have always responded to as a learner. I like it when people teach me through stories. It feels personal. Intimate.

It feels real.

The most fortuitous of all these coincidences is the fact that tomorrow morning I will be sharing the stories my six subjects tell in my video That Safe Space. It will be an easy connection for the people who come and who have been attending this conference for the last few days. I'm hoping that those who come will enjoy the film; I'm confident that they will. My only concern is that because it's the final slot before the farewell lunch, many participants will have already left for their flights home.

But that will be their loss. At this point, my attitude is "Let go, let God." It will be what it will be. Those who stay and choose to make their way into my presentation will hear some touching, important stories. My hope is that they will be inspired by the stories that they hear, and that they'll be inspired to go back home and create, and gather their own stories.

In my father's words, I'm hoping they will keep telling the story. It's in this way that we will change education for the better.