100 Books Like Storytelling with Children

Mother Nature must be very grateful this handbook exists. Within its 368 pages is a treasury of time-tested stories, creative activities, and methods that environmental educators and storytellers can use to affect people’s pro-environmental behaviour. Its collection of 21 chapters share a myriad of ways to use storytelling for a greener world. Each chapter has a different author(s), bringing their perspective on environment, community, and learning through stories. They explore the links between storytelling and emotional literacy, place, environmental justice, connecting with alienated youngsters, how to encourage children and adults’ curiosity about nature, building community, sustainability, and indigenous peoples, local legends, human-animal communication, and how to co-create a sustainable future together.

This is a book for all who work with people – in other words, it is a book for everyone. It is full of inspiration and practical tools to bring transformation and healing into your daily life, wherever you are. During times of conflict, storytelling dedicated to peace and reconciliation has proven successful in creating a common ground between people of all ages, from different cultures and disparate world views.

The New Story includes more than 30 tales from around the world plus easy-to-do exercises, with contributions from six modern storytellers at work in places like Israel, Kurdistan, and Sierra Leone.

Birds of Heaven is a tiny book full of noble thoughts on why stories and storytelling are integral to our humanity. Okri, the Man Booker Prize author of ‘The Famished Road’, eloquently states ‘The universe began as a story… we are part human, part stories.’

The text contains two inspirational essays on the meaning of language and its power to shape our lives. The work presents an alternative spiritual response to the problems of the present day. It is bursting with beautiful and insightful gems.

Why do we tell stories? What power lies within storytelling? From the great myths and legends to enchanting fairy tales, parables, fables, and folk tales, stories can have a great healing and educative power. They come from our subconscious and imagination, deep inside us. They have much to teach us about ourselves and the world we create around us.

Described as a manual for ‘soul ecology’, in his book Kornberger first explores this ‘story power’, then explains how to apply it to help a child develop, or to heal and transform a child with difficulties. He then discusses the art and practicalities of creating new stories to help children with particular needs.

This is a valuable and inspiring book for teachers, parents, creative writers, and students of literature.

I found that owning a collection of tales organized by these themes was very useful. Over 100 short folktales on themes of cooperation, courage, diversity, empathy, friendship, generosity, honesty and fairness, perseverance, respect, responsibility, self-control, and bullying prevention. Pearmain also gives suggestions for telling these and for extending them in the classroom. Wrapping an idea in a story really helps the concept sink in for the listener. Having a collection like this helped me build programs for use in the library.

Matthew is a serial public speaking champion who basically should be entered in The Moth Hall of Fame asap. If you've never heard Matthew Dicks talk, pause this and go watch his videos online. He's that good. What I love about his book is that he shares how he crafts his own stories and shares some amazing tips on how to capture everyday events that can later on be turned into powerful stories. Although this book isn't so much geared towards business or work, I think everyone can learn a great deal from Matthew's impressive experience of making people pay attention and connect to what you say (both as a best-selling novelist, school teacher, and public speaking champion).

This is not even a motherhood-focused book, but it absolutely had to make this list. It completely transformed my motherhood journey. It helped me find my new identity in motherhood. It allowed me to recognize that I have stories to tell - about my experience as a mother and also about myself separate from motherhood.

It allowed me to take life a little slower and be more intentional and mindful in my living and parenting. It’s essentially what moved me to start writing my poetry book in the first place. It helped illuminate my life in a way I never noticed before. I am a better mother because of this book. 

I feel deeply connected to this book because it helped me navigate the break-up of my marriage.

It puts into beautifully poetic words what I was feeling on an intuitive level about the transformative power of telling our own stories and the importance of ‘storying out’ unarticulated experiences.

Becoming a "storycatcher" and taking ownership of my story pulled me through a dark time and set me on the path toward a more empowering narrative. 

I found Suber’s book eye-opening about film. His insight into the true meaning of films was enlightening. I liked the way he examined film, sometimes minute by minute, to reveal their true meaning. He reminded me of the true influence that films have on society and society’s influence on film.

His writing was clear and concise, and he inspired me to add more depth to my own writing. 

When I read this book, it was the full Jade Phoenix trilogy put into one paperback, so for me it was a really long book that showed someone completely fail in life, then drag himself back up and crawl his way to the top. It also exposed me to the ‘Clans’ and what they meant. 

Position by merit. Earning your place through combat. A desire to prove yourself and gain power, but not by sucking up or backstabbing. Imagine a nation led by warriors instead of politicians. Even though the Clans aren’t the ‘good guys,’ there’s a huge difference between this book and all others. Enough that it stuck with me and the concept was reused in my own book as an homage to these Battletech books.