Week 3: This is your brain on stories, any questions?

I recently read The Science of Storytelling: Why Telling a Story is the Most Powerful Way to Activate Our Brains, by Leo Widrich.  Widrich wrote the article after examining how a switch from bullet point marketing to story telling caused sign-ups for his product, Buffer, to go through the roof.  I had always felt like I learned and connected better with materials presented in story form rather than a bullet point slide show, but instead of it being personal preference as I had thought, it is actually rooted in science.

Storytelling is something we all can enjoy, whether we are reading a book, watching a movie, or gossiping with a friend.  The question is, why do we feel so much more engaged when we hear a narrative about events?  The answer to this question is actually very simple.  When listening to a powerpoint presentation we activate the language processing part of the brain, but that is it, nothing else.  That all changes when we are being told a story.  Not only does a story activate the language center but also the areas of the brain that we would use if we were experiencing the story ourselves.  A story about about how a certain food tastes will engage our sensory cortex, as a story about a physical activity will engage our motor cortex.  This can be the key to having a profound impact on learning in our classrooms.

Digital storytelling tools such as those listed at http://www.schrockguide.net/digital-storytelling.html can help us deliver these to our students.  They can also be a means to facilitate communication and knowledge transfer between classmates.

Have you ever heard a story that helped you learn a new concept or connect with the material on a more personal level?  Was it delivered through one of the linked tools?