Men use stories to teach life lessons
In front of a small classroom full of kids at Ohio Hispanic Coalition East, professional storyteller Jim Flanagan wrapped an elastic exercise band around the thin waist of a volunteer, secured the child’s arms, then asked the student to throw a football. The boy struggled against the band and the children chuckled as Flanagan told them: “This is what it means not to be able to read.”
Flanagan, 73, said he couldn’t read “phonetically well” until the summer before seventh grade, when a neighbor tutored him.
“I read my first book at the end of the summer, never done that before,” he said. “I probably had a learning disability, but back in those days, you were just dumb.”
Now Flanagan, a long way from illiteracy, is a published author with five children’s books, three of which have won awards. When he tells stories to kids, he said he incorporates the reading demonstration to let struggling students know: “I know how you feel, kid.”
“It’s a visual, and it works,” Flanagan said. “Kids will remember that.”
The former middle school principal went straight into education in 1968 after serving in the Army. When he retired 30 years later, students remembered his stories. At an assembly held in his honor, several students suggested he become a storyteller. Until then, he said, “It’d never occurred to me there was such a thing.”
After attending a few storytelling conferences, he gave it a try. In 1999, he placed second in a national storytelling competition. Since then, he has traveled the country and as far as Ireland, telling stories at schools, libraries and anywhere else kids are listening.
On top of reading, he discusses other problems kids face. He said he helps them brainstorm ways to stop bullies “without smackin’ ‘em over the head.”
One African-American student, he said, was being called the N-word by a classmate. After hearing Flanagan’s tips, the student decided to scream in the tormentor’s face to stop the bullying, and it worked.
“Within the next two weeks, that girl was screamed at two more times, by other kids,” Flanagan said. He thinks storytelling is the best way to teach character education.
“They get caught up in the story,” Flanagan said. “You can teach ’em without them realizing they’re being taught.”
His most recent performance, at the Ohio Hispanic Coalition East in Whitehall, was part of a program called Columbus Story Adventures, where storytellers perform and pass out books to kids. The program, organized by Storytellers of Central Ohio, has been placing books in kids’ hands for more than 10 years. Flanagan and fellow storyteller Frank McGarvey have been performing at Hispanic Coalition events for about six years, free of charge.
“We do like to get money for the job,” McGarvey said. “But this we do from the heart.”
“We go and buy books at the Scholastic book sale so we are giving the kids new books,” Flanagan said. “Some of ’em have never had a book before.”
Daisy Oyola, the coalition’s East site coordinator, said the presentations are a huge hit and help students stay engaged in their education during the summer.
“The kids love it, we have noticed,” Oyola said. “They have done an excellent job.”
McGarvey teaches kids about reading, Flanagan about writing.
“Between us, we have — this sounds terrible — probably 15,000 performances,” Flanagan said. Their shared book, “Favorite Stories,” a collection of tales Flanagan calls “easy reading but high interest,” is in its third printing.
Flanagan also teaches writing during the summers at Thurber House — a literary center for writers and readers in the Columbus home of James Thurber, former author, humorist and New Yorker cartoonist. For the past two years, Flanagan has served as the in-house storyteller for Nationwide Children’s Hospital — a position he invented — telling tales to bedridden kids every Wednesday.
“He’s beloved, for sure,” said Jennifer Patterson, of the hospital’s Family Resources Department. “Families really appreciate the fact that there’s something like this available.”
“I go up to the rooms ... I tell to kids, I tell to parents” and sometimes to hospital staff, Flanagan said. “People are always amazed that a hospital has a storyteller.”