Dear Dr. Sani:

The novelist Miguel de Cervantes, one of the world´s best storytellers, distinguished two types of stories: those attractive for their content and those whose beauty lies in the way of narrating. In higher education, a deductive structure is recommendable: state a general principle, and illustrate it with concrete examples. Those examples can often (though not always) take the form of brief stories. In such stories, the content must be 100% relevant to the general idea being illustrated, and the mode of narrating must be memorable, tasteful, orderly, and even humorous.

Dear All

We need to first differentiate between higher management education and training. In my view story telling may be more useful in training and that to for selective subjects. Secondly, story must include the period / environment of its failure or success or usefulness etc.

Dear Debi, I find stories attractive during seminars or lectures. My recent, week ago, was about Alois Alzheimer and his first patient Augusta Deter. I spoke of the important interview he made, analyzed structure etc. Students of special pedagogy, like stories very much.

Sometimes story-telling is useful to produce alertness. At 8 A.M., students tend to doze. In Biology 101 at Dartmouth College, my late professor W. Byers Unger used to use props with narrative to awaken students with humor. Who can forget his lecture on the black widow spider (Lactodectrus mactans)? He would hold up the model of an outhouse (rural latrine) and say, "The black widow spider makes her home in an aperture, and when she sees things passing through her web, she takes a bite." I do not think that we learned much from this tale, but we certainly woke up for more important lessons to follow.

Using stories in lectures will attract the students more and more

Using stories in lectures may or not enhance the lecture itself and may unfortunately not deliver the intended purpose mainly in a higher education setting. However, if one has chosen to use this strategy, the story has to be captivating and directly related to the topic at hand. Either way, instead of the lecture providing the story, you would let the students browse through and then share life experiences relating to topics. That way you will have the class involved

Of course, I prefer and always try to connect real life experiences as stories, while giving lessons.

In my lectures I alsways use short stories to illustrate the facts and models. What shows most successful and interesting for students is if you can tell a very personal own story around some special dedicated facts. This makes the concept or model you explain convincing to students. In example when discussing somehting like the term "experience" and the role of "experiences in managing change" I tell students how I sometimes find my way in public transport in cities which I've never been before. Then I tell them how I moved in this citiy at my second visit - this shows them clearly what "experience' means and next we use the fact "experience" to discuss changes in organizational routines. With this in mind students understand behaviour of individuals in complex situations and constellations.

In my business ethics classes, I use a lot of short stories on a weekly basis. In these, I tell students of people I've met and the problems these people faced, and especially how they felt. I do not supply written stories. I tell stories and students usually engage and ask questions. When I don't have the "true" answer, I make it up, which is OK as long as it makes a good/pedagogical story. They don't take more than two to three minutes to tell. Now, students' analyses are not always working in a straight line but it's really OK to let them explore. They like stories. Stories strike their imaginations and are easy to remember. They become archetypical illustrations of the concepts I want students to work on. I also encourage students to help me develop a databank of movie titles related to class topics. I can see that younger students use movie plots as a useful substitute for the work experience they don't yet have.

We use stories for development competences. We use of storytelling in teaching practique increase the motivation, learning and changing certain behaviors in students.

Yes. Telling stories that connect real life examples that will resonate with the subject matter always helps to increase the interest in students. They will assimilate much better the concepts.

Stories...

http://udi.psi.ucm.es/viktor/combo/

Story telling is a good way of making students engage and feel connected to the topic.

i generally used stories at the start of the topic without letting student know what topic we are discussing, raise certain questions from the story itself and via answers i take them to the topic !!

People also use opening and closing cases for instance

Thanks @K.C Patrick Low

Always Welcome Sir :)

Thanks Sir @Kamal !!

Storytelling can be combinbed very well with Problem based learning. You tell a story - or let the students tell stories. Then you analyse them, find appropriate solutions and summarize the learning. I think it is a great tool and I use storytelling in many different ways and settings.

A fox looked at his shadow at sunrise and said, "I will have a camel for lunch today." And all morning he went about looking for camels. But at noon he saw his shadow again -- and he said, "A mouse will do."

I haven't heard a more enlightening shortest story than this by Khalil Gibran. 'Jatak Katha', 'Hitopadesha', 'Zen Stories'... all are examples of Teaching (virtue) with the help of stories where animals are playing different roles.

I have a collection of Management Lessons through Stories that I use all the time to make a point or convey my message...! The art of story telling is a must for any communicator... otherwise what is the reason a 'Sholay' becomes a milestone...?

My dear ..story telling is a very old, effective and good way ...God uses always this way to confince people through most religins like quran

The story telling method of teaching/learning/impacting is no doubt is very effective.This comes in the realm of non-formal communication. Young, old, educated and illiterate become a captive audience.As Margret said earlier it can be a two way process the students may have a story or two making it a compelling experience

Story telling is very convincing and effective. It increases the elasticity of the lecture.

But many times, the students remember the story and forget the moral applied in management context. Also, relating the story exactly to every aspect of the management concept in discussion becomes difficult.

Teaching by storytelling is very complex and powerful way of transferring knowledge. The problem is that it asks a completely different organization and particular behaviour of the instructor. I am not telling that it is impossible but it takes time to set up a good class by this way. I used to use the case method, which is a kind of story where students have more active role in the teaching process. I suggest you to take a look at the Harvard business school Case Method's Kit and also "Education for Judgment: The Artistry of Discussion Leadership" (C. Roland Christensen, David A. Garvin, Ann Sweet).

Story telling!!! Story telling is an art where a narrator captures his audience imagination and takes them to a place they have never been before. This art is very strong in societies with strong oral tradition. Just to give an example, the city of Peshawar sits on the crossroads and serves as a gateway to central asia. During old time, caravans use to pass through this city and travelers use to rest in local inns in Kissakhwani. The word Kissa is a Persian word meaning story and khwan means narrator, hence the meaning of kissakhwan is story teller. Travelers use to tell the stories of faraway lands such is Bokhara, Samarkand, Kashghar o Badaghshan. It happens to be that acclaimed Indian movie actors and producers such as Prithvi Raj, Dilip Kumar, came from the same place, Kissakhwani. In order to narrate a story in a way that it will capture the listener’s imagination and will guide them through unfamiliar places, narrator has to have artistic imagination. For a good teacher, I believe, he/she has to be a good narrator. I remember during my undergrad days, I would fall asleep during “History of Arts” 2 hours lectures. Now I realize that it wasn’t the subject that put me out but rather the format it was delivered to me.

Not Every where.... Depends on conditions .... in some case this is very useful....

Story telling is a powerful tool to convey wisdom that exceeds the boundaries of just replicating textbook knowledge. It does depend, however, on the skills of the narrator and her/his professional background. I've seen lecturers struggling, that have no real experience in the business world outside academia. To my reading, the story teller in a business economics class (from accounting to marketing or strategy) should be a distiller of the best of both worlds, theory and practice, in order to concincingly reach out to students. Story telling isn't always the lecturers job, though. When doing my Business Planning and Performance Management Course, where student teams have to conduct a highly competitive simulation game throughout a whole semester, I always show the film "Chariots of Fire" by Lord David Puttnam in the beginning. Chariots of Fire tells a story about correct behaviour, chivalry, courtlyness, gradciousness and good conduct under high pressure, that I could never lecture in such a profound manner myself. So, storytelling can be a combined effort, using technology, too ;-)

I had excellent History Professor for World History. I recollect the subject well. But a subject like Quantum Mechanics at Physics Major could not afford the luxury to live on stories. The Uncertainty Principle, Pauli's exclusion principle etc., more mathematical and conceptual rigour. Hence, story telling may be effective depending upon:

1. The subject

2. The audience

3. Availability of time

4. Teacher's social and mental make up etc.,

However, short films and video lectures with anecdotes supplementing the regular lecture may prove to be valuable.

Even there (Quantum Physics, etc.), story telling could be of substantial value. When explaing dark matter, the extraordinary life of it's visionary Fritz Zwicky could tell a well-remembered story. Same holds true, when philosophical questions are underpinned, like in the stories of Stephen Hawkings, and there might be a beauty in explaining Knightean Uncertainty with it's story of origin and impact, paired with its mathematics. Generally speaking, I assume the story telling does rather depend on the breath of scope of the story teller than on the "complexity" or "exotisicm" of the topic. The letters of Srinivasa Ramanujan Aiyangar are full of mathematical formulas, but what brillinant stories you could tell with them, that students would never forget ;-)

Very strong statement from Sadagopan Parthasarathy. Story telling is a powerful tool for good leadership to convey the message to their subordinates and also make a group discussion to analyze the problem. i.e moral applied in management.