What is Storytelling?

“Nothing sticks in your head better than a story. It can express the most complex ideas in the most digestible ways.” - Sam Balter.

Storytelling has been an important part of our lives since the beginning of human history. It has allowed people to make sense of the world and derive its deeper meaning. The techniques used for storytelling may have changed since then, but the power it holds to engage and connect with the audience remains the same. The best public speakers are also storytellers who use storytelling to bring their message to life. It is one of the best ways to ensure that the audience remembers your message.

But what is storytelling, and how is it related to public speaking? Let’s find out.

Storytelling is an interactive form of art that involves words and actions to disclose the images and elements of a story while encouraging the audience’s imagination. It is an art form that holds a place in every society and culture. Why? Because the act of telling stories is a universal language that anyone, irrespective of their hometown, dialect, or origin, can understand. They stimulate the imaginations of the listener and create a sense of community.

Storytelling is a critical skill to have across every career path. In regards to public speaking, storytelling couldn’t be more important. It helps you draw your audience into your speech by establishing an emotional connection with them. Apart from the obvious benefit of engaging your audience, telling a story is far easier than memorizing a script. Great storytellers can make even the most ordinary experiences captivating. After you add a personal touch to your speech, the audience will be delighted with everything you have to say.

Importance of Storytelling

Storytelling plays an essential role in public speaking. The stories that each one of us has inside is the thing that makes us human. In reality, we are all storytellers, and with practice, we can improve the skill of storytelling. People tell stories to open up the world of possibilities with images and words. Stories allow us to connect with their journey and enhance our understanding of the world around us.

1. Storytelling is Interactive

Storytelling is a two-way interaction between the person telling the story and the audience. How a storyteller tells a story is influenced by the listeners’ responses. Therefore, the art of storytelling emerges from the cooperation and interaction of the speaker and listeners.

2. Storytelling Hones Communication Skills

Storytelling is the earliest form of communication. Even before human beings could read and write, they relied on stories to share information with each other. Storytelling is a natural way to learn the basic pillars of any language, including grammar and vocabulary. Stories follow a logical flow that helps a person develop a habit of structured communication. The process of storytelling builds confidence in the speaker. When a person has confidence, they can better communicate with clarity.

3. Storytelling Improves Your Active Imagination

Remember when you would tell each other stories at night around the bonfire? How did everyone carefully listen to the story, hung on to every word, and set the scene in their mind’s eye as the story unfolded? That’s the power of storytelling! A story is a powerful tool to help kids be imaginative and creative. Through storytelling, children get a glimpse of different cultures and lifestyles.

4. Storytelling Enhances the Expressive Nature of the Speaker

Stories require the storyteller to convey their experiences in an expressive way that connects with the audience. With the practice of telling engaging stories, you can enhance your expressive nature and tell more compelling stories in the future.

5. Storytelling Teaches New Words

Stories allow people the opportunity to improve their vocabulary. It helps them infer the meanings of words they do not know. Furthermore, it helps students develop their vocabulary by making connections between the known and unknown. As a result, storytelling encourages students to learn new words incidentally.

Key Elements of Storytelling

Every person enjoys a great story. However, telling a good story is not that easy. There are five key elements of storytelling that you need to focus on to deliver an engaging story. These key elements include:-

1. Character

The character of the story is the most important element of storytelling. Without a character, no story can excel. Why? Because it is a human tendency to connect with characters than a bunch of information. Unless the story has some characters with whom the audience can relate, it is hard to immerse them in the story.

2. Plot (or the story)

The plot is a story’s sequence of events. It is a critical element of storytelling. As a storyteller, you must know your plot; however, you need not plan everything in advance. It would be best to allow the plot to develop as you write in response to the main characters’ behaviors and motivations.

3. Expressions

Expressions play a huge role in the art of storytelling. Without expressions, the storyteller may not be able to engage the audience. As a good storyteller, you should vary your voice’s pace, pitch, and volume and use pauses to add a dramatic effect. Furthermore, you can use your facial expressions to match the story’s mood, appear comfortable and relaxed, and make eye contact to engage the audience.

4. Words

Understanding the importance of choosing the right words is critical for developing entertaining stories. Words help you craft memorable characters and unforgettable plots. They help your story breathe, create memories, and move the audience emotionally. Moreover, the right words in the right place can help you impact your listeners.

5. Structure

The story structure or the narrative structure is the storyline, the organizational framework of the story. There are several ways to structure your story, but the three basic ingredients that must be included in every story are - a beginning, middle, and end. A successful story starts with an enticing incident, moves into action, builds a climax, and settles in a satisfying conclusion or resolution. When these three sections are individually captivating and work well together, the overall story becomes compelling and smooth.

How to Be a Good Storyteller?

There’s a reason why people watch movies or read stories - it’s because they love to get absorbed in a good, exciting story. This is why stories have a long-lasting effect on the listener’s mind. However, if you tell your stories poorly, you will lose your audience’s interest.

Have you ever observed someone hold the audience in the palm of their hands by narrating a fascinating story, maybe during a TED talk, radio show, or a group gathering? How do these storytellers engage their listeners? Read on to find out.

1. Practice and Practice Some More - With Friends and Family

No skill can be perfected without practice, not even storytelling. It may sound weird to practice a story in advance, especially a simple story that is just a small part of your presentation. However, practicing is an essential aspect of establishing good storytelling techniques. Not only will it allow you to develop your rhythm, but it will also help identify the gaps and shortcomings in the narrative and take measures to improve it.

You can practice your storytelling skills in front of friends and family and ask for their feedback to improve. Practicing with them can help you know if your story and the narration impact the listeners as you want them to be. They can also help you with the volume and pitch of your voice in different sections of the story.

2. Write One Story Everyday to Improve Your Creativity

If you are telling a story orally, it is always a good practice to write down what you plan to say. This can give you a written outline of the points you want to address. If it’s your first time in storytelling, you might want to write the complete story. However, make sure not to narrate your story with your head buried in paper.

One effective storytelling tip is to write a story every day and not just when you have to narrate it in a speech. Writing a story every day can help you have a broader perspective of the world around you and, as a result, improve your creativity. Moreover, you should try crafting stories in different genres to get out of your comfort zone and become confident.

3. Engaging With Your Audience is the Key to Storytelling

Have you ever stood in front of a group of people where most of them were not listening to you? Some might be busy on their phones, while others may be looking around mindlessly. That happens because of a lack of attention, resulting from a lack of engagement. To craft a good story, you need not only a good storyline but also the need to connect with your audience through effective presentation skills.

Combine your compelling narrative with effective presentation skills to keep your listeners hooked to the story. Make eye contact and help them feel like a part of the story. Use gestures and body language that helps them imagine the situations in your story. Your role as a storyteller is not just describing the events but making them interesting enough that the people want to listen.

4. Do Not Forget to Stay Calm While Storytelling

If you are new to storytelling, it is natural to feel nervous or anxious while speaking. However, it is important to face your fear and calm your nerves before narrating a story. Why? Because if you are not calm, you may forget the flow of the story, making it difficult for the audience to grasp its meaning or connect with it emotionally. Good storytellers always stay relaxed while storytelling so that they can focus on the audience and help them connect with the plot.

Moreover, if you feel anxious, you may be tempted to rush through the story and get it over with. Try staying calm and speaking at a reasonable pace that allows the listeners to digest what you are trying to say.

5. Keep Your Story Short and Crisp by Cutting Down the Details

If you want to become a great storyteller and prevent your audience from nodding off, you must keep your story concise and to the point. There is nothing more monotonous than listening to a person ramble on with a story that seems to have no end and clearly no point. The more you work on your story, the more points you will find to cut out of it.

Effective storytellers understand that every detail is not important. Sticking to important details and making your story concise is the key to keeping the audience intrigued and interested. Furthermore, it is best if you keep the story simple. Despite the twists and turns, the story should be easy to follow and not leave your audience feeling confused.

6. Make it Personal to Connect With the Audience

In which story would you be more interested: A cricketer talking about how his team put in efforts and aced the match or a cricketer talking about his personal childhood experiences that made him decide to take up cricket as his career? We think we all would want to listen to the second one. It is human nature to feel invested in the personal story of another person. Storytellers who reveal a part of their own life and become a little vulnerable are more successful in delivering a compelling story than those who do not.

You can also connect with the audience by engaging their emotions. Instead of just talking about facts and figures, talk about how you and others felt resulting from the various events. The listeners will rely on you to guide them through the feelings they should have about the particular aspects of the story. Your words, body language, and facial expressions play a vital role in highlighting the emotional elements.

Why Should Your Child Learn Storytelling Skills?

With the convenience of technology today, parents usually send their kids to sleep after letting them watch their favorite cartoons. However, nothing can be compared with reading bedtime stories to the kids. Children love stories and books because they get introduced to ideas and creatures they haven’t met before.

Stories help children to learn more about themselves and the world around them. And the best part? Storytelling can help spark a passion for reading from their early years, which not only helps in their development but is also fun. Some other benefits of helping your child learn storytelling skills include:-

1. Enlightens Ethics and Virtues in Your Little Ones

Every kid loves to listen to stories. And not just listen; they try to emulate the characters’ attributes in real life. Storytelling greatly impacts your children’s attributes. Therefore, you should read them stories with characters that have positive attributes such as honesty, wisdom, compassion, kindness, etc.

2. Improves Their Communication Skills

Reading stories to children can increase their willingness to express themselves and clearly communicate their feelings and thoughts. Storytelling also helps them enhance their vocabulary by learning new words. When telling stories to your kids, encourage them by asking questions and sharing their thoughts about a character’s behavior and how they think the story might move forward.

3. Helps Them Understand Their Culture and Roots

Telling traditional and historical stories to children in childhood can enhance their understanding of customs and traditions prevalent in the family. Narrating stories from around the world can help develop cultural awareness among kids.

4. Boosts Their Listening and Thinking Skills

Holding a child’s attention for a long time is one of the most difficult tasks for a parent. Children find it arduous to concentrate on something for a prolonged period and end up talking more, or their minds start wandering somewhere else. However, a lively session of storytelling can help them be more attentive and improve their listening skills. When children listen actively, they also understand and think better.

5. Fosters Creativity and Imagination

When you read stories to your children, they imagine their characters, events, places, and cultures. Storytelling can let their imaginations run wild as the narration unfolds. The child uses their own perspective of the story to build a world of imagination for themselves. This can help enhance their creativity and imagination, making room for new ideas.

6. Develops Social Skills

Storytelling helps children learn to pay attention to the storyteller or the other people listening. It opens their mind to other people’s thoughts and opinions. They learn to be patient and understand that others may not interpret things in the same way as them.

Reading stories to your children can help them develop storytelling skills that prove useful in various aspects of their lives. When children develop the ability to share their thoughts and ideas in storytelling, they build important skills such as creativity, confidence, communication skills, social skills, and language development. These key skills can help them be successful at school and in future employment.

We Are All Storytellers

By our basic nature, we, as human beings, are storytellers. Telling stories is a basic human instinct, and each one of us does that all the time. We spend a lifetime gathering a collection of experiences and learning to tell them almost as long. Everyone has several stories that they tell to make sense of the world during their lifetime. Depending on the occasion and audience, we tell a different story to a friend or relative than we do at a job interview.

We may not realize we are telling stories because they are such a common thing in our lives. Sometimes, the stories we tell are true; other times, we may have to tweak the truth or add made-up ideas to aid our survival. For instance, a person who forgot their friend’s birthday may make up a story to save themselves from the wrath! Or you may tell your favorite ghost stories around the bonfire! You may or may not realize this, but we all have stories to explain, inform, or entertain.

Wrapping it Up!

Stories are a great way to communicate with people. Many people believe that they cannot tell stories and that it is a fine art that only some people can master. However, the truth be told, we are all natural storytellers, and we tell stories all the time. But you should most definitely improve your storytelling skills to deliver an engaging speech and be successful in your life. So, watch famous storytellers or join online courses to master the art of storytelling.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the four types of storytelling?

The four types of storytelling include:-

Value story: these stories share your values and throw light on your culture
Vulnerable story: drives emotional impact by sharing your personal story
Informative story: informs the audience about something
Entertaining story: the sole purpose is to entertain people

What are the five elements of storytelling?

The five key elements that are a part of any story include:-

Character
Plot
Expressions
Words
Structure

What are the 4 Ps of storytelling?

The 4Ps of storytelling include:-

People: the main characters of the story
Place: the geographical location of the story
Purpose: the meaning of your story that you want your audience to understand
Plot: the structure of the story that is presented before the audience

Why is storytelling so important?

Stories are a powerful tool that can teach people new ideas, connect with the audience, and drive change. Storytelling is important as it stimulates our brain, helps us absorb information, and feel emotions such as happiness, empathy, and pain as if they were playing out in real life.

What is a storytelling technique?

Storytelling is one of the essential techniques for connecting with the audience. A storytelling technique is how a person presents their story in front of a group of people. Mastering this technique can help people deliver compelling stories and persuade people. You can master the technique by:-