There are numerous writings of very reputable people talking about the many benefits of storytelling, not only in children education, but in family life. But there are a few important points that are frequently overlooked, so I plan to discuss the ones I consider more relevant in this article.

The greatest benefit of education, no doubt, is the abilitythat has every tale to convey values . Perhaps we have not consciously made good on it, but if you think, most values more firmly rooted in our own personality where taken from a story: in “The three little pigs”, we learnt the importance of well finished work; “The tortoise and the hare” were showing us that constancy and modesty had borne fruit, and “The cicada and the ant” teached us that it was more profitable to be working than being a laggard. If you want to better understand what I am talking about, take a look theseshort stories for children atBedtime Stories, a site with a huge collection of stories to teach values to children.

This is no surprise when you think about how our brain works. Every story, including tales, has a logical argument that unites the different parts, making them much easier to remember. Regarding this point, our memory can store because this script acts as the linking component of all elements in the story, facilitating to access them. As the moral of the story acts as a summary of it, it is what is better remembered. For example, one can forget what all details about the cicada and the ant, but do not forget that one was spending time while the other worked hard to store food.

Second, and closely related to the above, is theusefulness of stories to teach new things . Due to the fact that it is easier to recall the main story, other details are easier to be remembered as they are linked to a specific time mark in the story. Morover, consider this: most relevant people in history used stories to teach their messages, Jesus being the most noticiable case; his stories were excellent to teach to every kind of people. For instance, stories are so powerful to our memory, that they can greatly modify our knowledge. For instance, Disney’s movie Hercules helped lots of people to know something about Greek mythology, but once they get this “knowledge”, it will be very difficult to make many people get ride off the idea that Hercules was son of Zeus’s wife, which is not true. …

Children will be excited about spending a few minutes with their parents, when we are devoting them all of our attention. They love, and detect, when we are able to let our adult problems aside. Fortunately, creating an educative children story is something that requires full mind dedicationcustomizes stories at bedtime are great to create strong links with the children . These days, children are used to talk and interact with their parents while they still have other things in their minds. So they will react with enthisiasm if they detect their parents are devoting them their full attention. The positive impact of this emotional link between parents and children is another factor that boost memory performance. Children have so powerful memory mechanisms, that you will check that they store many details for long time, when they lernt them as part of a story. I myself have discovered many times how my children were surprisingly recalling many low level details of stories I had told them long time ago, and never ever talking again about them.

is the perfect way to enhance children’s attention, a very rare capability these days, originated by an overstimulating visual world , caused by the fact of living in a world with so many visual stimuli. Using an out of the room light, and with the reassuring presence of their parents, children are prepared to open their ears to the world carried by the story, and without even realizing it, they are learning to focus their attention; but not only that, they do also use heard as a primary sense, quite the opposite of what will happen during daylight. I usually take advantage of this situation to further stimulate their visual sense, but in a creative way, as too many stimuli so perfectly constructed may do not help develop properly. So I flood stories and characters of bright colors, forcing them to imagine each part of the story.

from a behavioural point of view, custom stories are great to check what was the actual behavior during the day. AAlong with the story, we can praise or censor their actions during the day, as they are still “fresh” in their minds . Taking advantage of the proximity in time and the freshness of their memories about what happened, through the story, we can praise what they have done well, or censor and try to change what they did not do so well. In this very emotional moment, children are so accessible, that a story that exemplifies clearly the attitude we like is much more effective than several hours of sermons and good words.