Oral storytelling – a powerful medium for the muslim child
The benefits of a local muslim oral storytelling space are immense for our children. Telling stories is not just a cultural pastime.
It is:
- A most powerful medium of absorbing and learning language
far more effective than reading books, atleast for the very young
Research shows that very young children cannot really learn language from reading books because the content is often too out of context for their brains to really make sense of it.
- A powerful medium for absorbing faith, good values and virtuous character
Listening to an oral story is the building of a deep connection between the audience and the storyteller, the bringing together of hearts, a bond that nurtures a sense of shared experience and of emotion that makes the lessons within more impactful and memorable.
- A space to build interpersonal and communication skills and become confident speakers
- A means for building our children’s muslim identity
In a time when there are so many narratives confusing our own and our children’s identities, This coming together for the oral transmission of stories from our muslim tradition is a very helpful space to work out what it means to be muslim in the modern context within the western world. It is indeed a way of building community, a space to pass down cultural values and tradition.
- A means of fostering important emotional skills, such as empathy and understanding.
- Oral stories help children to appreciate
- different perspectives and cultures
- the diversity which exists within our own muslim tradition.
- learn to have harmonious relationships with muslims of all traditions and people of other faiths.
- learn the mediums of promoting cultural exchange and dialogue which is hugely important for their engagement and integration into the wider world.
For the homeschooling community this is a pivotal space to set up:
- to widen the breadth and depth of children’s learning
- to gain from a variety of figures who model good values and character.
So in essence oral stories satisfy many of the educational and psycho-social needs for our children.
Research shows that emotional intelligence(EQ) is a stronger predictor of future success than merely IQ. Here we propose an oral story telling club as an immensely powerful space for children to gain this very essential EQ which can affect academic performance, social interactions, and wellbeing.
And for parents, the art of storytelling is also an immensely powerful and vital tool;
- Through the power of story telling parents can capture and captivate the attention of their children – by creating and telling their own stories to deliver to their children knowledge of all things that are important for them.
A safe space for oral storytelling gives our children and their parents a chance to:
- Develop strong communication and interpersonal skills
- Develop empathy and other emotional intelligence skills.
- Pass down cultural values and traditions to develop identity
- Entertain children while learning to build their language, character, culture and more.
- Foster creativity and imagination.
- Foster skills of positive dialogue with people of differing views within the muslim tradition and people of other faiths
- And much much more.