Level: Awareness, Novice
Time Limit: 60-90 seconds or length of book.
Target Audience: Volunteer at the local library for a story hour with a group of twenty children, four to six years old. Assume that the reading area is located within a larger room, though separated somehow. You will need to speak loudly to keep the tykes’ attention and everyone can hear you.
Instructions: Read a short, engaging child’s book or story. Practice it a few times. Be sure that you rehearse enough to maintain eye contact 75% of the time. Speak with a relaxed throat and voice for natural projection. Use inflections to create excitement and enthusiasm. Use facial expressions to portray the story’s emotions. Energize the story in every way you can, with vocal sounds and props if available.
Delivery Options
Option 1: Read the story to an imaginary audience in the largest room you can find. Use pillows or stuffed animals to substitute for the young tykes described in your target audience.
Option 2: Read the story to an imaginary audience in an outdoor open space like your backyard or a public park. Allow the plants and trees to substitute for the young tykes described in your target audience.
Option 3: Find some children who would enjoy listening to your story.
Option 4: Go to the library or local bookstore and actually read to a group of children.
Purpose: Ease yourself into the delivery process by providing a non-threatening venue. Focus on the variety of vocal inflections you use. Project your voice as much as you can. Create excitement by the energy you put into your voice.
Skills to Practice: Breathe deeply. Explore your voice: your projection, your vocal inflection. Relax; get comfortable speaking in a non-threatening environment.
Resources: If you need a story, you may find a suitable one on this online list is a website with an array of stories read by various authors. You can listen to the emphasis they put on words, the pace, and the emotion they add. If you worry about sounding monotone or boring, listen to the reader read one page, turn down the volume, and follow their example of emphasis as you read the page.
Sample Speech: The Boy Who Cried Wolf!
Author: Aesop’s Fables
Note: You can read the entire background or just introduce and share the author.
Background: Aesop was reportedly a slave and storyteller who lived in Ancient Greece between 620 and 564 BC. Aristotle, Herodotus, and Plutarch all referenced Aesop and his fables, but no written stories penned by him have been found. At least six Greek and Latin authors captured the stories on paper, but their writings were lost over time. Even so, over the past 2,500 years, his words have not only survived, but also travelled around the globe. They have been modified and repeatedly shared in many forms, from sermons to children’s stories. Due to constant revision and interpretation, today’s body of fables attributed to Aesop bears little relation to those he originally told. The first English version of Aesop’s Fables was printed in 1484 by William Caxton (Keller, J. E., & Keating, L. C. (1993), and even those have evolved.
The Boy Who Cried Wolf
There once was a shepherd boy who was bored as he sat on the hillside watching the village sheep. To amuse himself he took a great breath and sang out, “Wolf! Wolf! The Wolf is chasing the sheep!”
The villagers came running up the hill to help the boy drive the wolf away. But when they arrived at the top of the hill, they found no wolf. The boy laughed at the sight of their angry faces.
“Don’t cry ‘wolf’, shepherd boy,” said the villagers, “when there’s no wolf!” They went grumbling back down the hill.
Later, the boy sang out again, “Wolf! Wolf! The wolf is chasing the sheep!” To his naughty delight, he watched the villagers run up the hill to help him drive the wolf away.
When the villagers saw no wolf, they sternly said, “Save your frightened song for when there is really something wrong! Don’t cry ‘wolf’ when there is no wolf!”
But the boy just grinned and watched them go grumbling down the hill once more.
Later, he saw a real wolf prowling about his flock. Alarmed, he leapt to his feet and sang out as loudly as he could, “Wolf! Wolf!”
But the villagers thought he was trying to fool them again, and so they didn’t come.
At sunset, everyone wondered why the shepherd boy hadn’t returned to the village with their sheep. They went up the hill to find the boy. They found him weeping.
“There really was a wolf here! The flock has scattered! I cried out, “Wolf!” Why didn’t you come?”
An old man tried to comfort the boy as they walked back to the village.
“We’ll help you look for the lost sheep in the morning,” he said, putting his arm around the youth, “Nobody believes a liar. . . even when he is telling the truth!”