Step aside Cinderella and Goldilocks, the Longmont Library Spellbinders Storytellers have some tales to tell that can’t be found in any Grimm Brothers book.
Spellbinders is a nonprofit organization with 12 chapters across Colorado, New York and Virginia that enhances literacy skills, imagination and community relationships through telling stories to elementary school children, according to the website.
Spellbinders volunteers have dazzled classrooms across the St. Vrain Valley School District since 2001. This coming fall, storytime won’t look the same as it has in past years. Because classes will be conducted in a hybrid model or completely online, Spellbinders is working with the school district to find a virtual way to share their stories with classrooms.
Since June 2019, 37 Spellbinder volunteers visited 156 classrooms in 20 schools telling their stories to 3,762 children. Each volunteer visited their assigned classroom once a month.
That won’t be possible this year, and although a video call platform is no one’s preferred method of telling stories, trying to convey a story with a mask on just isn’t the same, Certified Trainer Kathy Santopietro said.
“It’s a real challenge for us. Storytelling was certainly meant to be face-to-face and eye-to-eye,” Santopietro said. “We’re going to try to keep oral storytelling alive and well through the time of COVID.”
Due to social distancing guidelines, Spellbinders canceled its volunteer storyteller training, scheduled for the month of August. The trainings, which are run through the Longmont Library, were canceled due to concerns about the age and health of new volunteers as well as citywide restrictions, said Children’s and Teens’ Librarian Kathleen Kunau.
Usually held each March and August, Spellbinders’ training workshops were moved to a virtual platform this year.
Spellbinders storytellers tell a variety of stories, Santopietro said, to include Irish folk tales, Russian and Polish tall tales and retellings of historical events from South America, Mexico and the U.S.
Most people have probably never heard of some of the titles because of the variety, which is reflected in the storytellers themselves just as much as the tales, said Santopietro. Volunteers are as diverse as the stories themselves. Some of the tellers are retired teachers or nurses, while others come from backgrounds such as accounting, microbiology and engineering.
“All those backgrounds, and when you get people in the same classroom and what they bring to that is stunning because they talk about how what they did in life influences their storytelling,” Santopietro said. “They had no idea they wanted to be a storyteller, but somehow, when they come in, they learn how to learn a story, make it their own and then tell it really well and something surfaces in them that they didn’t know they had.”
Storytelling leaves a lasting impact on the volunteers and the children, Santopietro said. “For the volunteers, when we ask them, ‘Why are you volunteering?’ Almost always they say it’s a way to give back to the community and to contribute to a sense of community among older people and children. It’s that intergenerational bond that’s so precious,” Santopietro said. “For the kids, the kids’ listening skills are really honed in. Because for so much of the day in a normal classroom, there’s very rarely a time when you are just listening. This is just pure listening and use of imagination.”
