Storytelling in the Classroom: Following-Up with Bloom's Taxonomy by Fran Stallings

Appeared in the Fall 1986 issue of the National Storytelling Journal, pgs. 12-15.

For reprint permission or to contact:
Fran Stallings
1406 Macklyn Lane
Bartlesville, OK 74006-5419
or call 1-800-525-4514

Very Brief Summary of Bloom's Taxonomy

1. KNOWLEDGE – remember learned material.
2. COMPREHESION – grasp meaning of learned material.
3. APPLICATION – use learned material in different but concrete situations.
4. ANALYSIS – break apart material to discover its parts and their relationships.
5. SYNTHESIS - create a new, unique pattern or product from given materials plus more.
6. EVALUATION - judge material by means of criteria.

The first ("lower") three levels check upon facts or explanations, as they were given; the second ("upper") three levels go beyond the given. To help remember the order: Keep Catching APes ANd Silly Elephants!

Sometimes we may want to follow classroom storytelling with an activity that involves the students. In my early days of storytelling, I found many story follow-up ideas in books and journals, but their variety bewildered me. How could I be sure to choose something that fit both the story and the students, and made an academic contribution as well? A system called "Blooms Taxonomy" has worked so well for me that I'd like to share it with you.

Of course the story comes first. Although we all agree that a story must be worth telling for its own sake, teachers are especially interested in a story which sets the scene for activity of familiar educational value. We can follow a story with thought-provoking discussion, creative writing or artwork, creative dramatics, or exercises in thinking skills and problem solving. Some activities also can serve as "story stretchers" for those times when we don't want to dilute the effect of a story by piling another one on top of it, but must fill the remaining minutes with something interesting and relevant. Storytellers who regularly visit classrooms, teacher-storytellers, and librarian-storytellers often find follow -up activities desirable for all these reasons.

But it is not always easy to pick story follow-ups that are appropriate, enjoyable, and educationally worthwhile. Some of the suggestions I have encountered look to me like little more than arts-and-crafts busywork, with scant connection to the story. Should we make a mobile of colored paper apples to follow "The Princess on the Glass Hill?" Other follow-ups, even in the same book or article, would certainly challenge the intellect of young adults. Could they hold a mock inquest into the events at Hamelin? I visit classrooms from kindergarten through senior high. What should I try?

Familiarity with the different ages helped me guess, and sometimes students participated eagerly in activities I tried. But sometimes I guessed wrong. Students wriggled, or their eyes glazed: the activity was too simple-minded for them, killing the excitement and interest sparked by the story. In other cases students became puzzled, tense, withdrawn: The activity was not as straightforward as it seemed, but I didn't know why. I needed a guideline to help me select appropriate follow-ups sensibly. I also needed something to guide improvised changes, in case a particular class leaped through my chosen activity in a few minutes, or hogged down in bewilderment.

A good friend and master teacher finally convinced me to learn a system for estimating what level of mental work is involved in each project or discussion question. The system reveals how challenging or complex a follow-up activity is. Looking at the wealth of suggestions in the literature, I could use this method to decide whether a particular activity suited a given class, how to adapt it, and how to prepare a class for it. The system even guides minute-by-minute progress with the class.

This system has the daunting name "Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives," but teachers just call it "Blooms." It has six ordered levels, from simplest to most complex: Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis and Evaluation. (See summary in Figure I.) In general, the first "lower" three levels review and reinforce students' learning while the "upper" three levels encourage more complex, creative thought.

Although Benjamin S. Bloom and his colleagues [1] originally developed the system to classify exam questions, teachers found that Blooms also helped them improve their questions for class discussions. Eventually Blooms became popular for evaluating whole curriculum units, particularly when the goal was to provide real enrichment instead of "more of the same stuff.' It can help us, too.

Few storytellers seem to have heard of Blooms, though many teachers are familiar with the system, especially if they have taken courses in special education. You can learn a lot more about Blooms from teachers' textbooks and manuals in university and city libraries (see footnote [2]). Here I will just describe the system briefly, explain how it can help us choose and adapt activities suggested in the literature, and show how Blooms helps guide on-the-spot improvising to suit a particular class.

First I will define the six levels as I understand them, illustrating each with examples [3] of typical discussion questions or other activities which require mental work at that level. For the sake of simplicity, all the examples are phrased as if to follow a single story, "The Musicians of Bremen"[4] from the Brothers Grimm.

1. KNOWLEDGE activities, using simple memory of the story in its original form, recall, relate, and organize facts. Students can repeat, define, list, describe, demonstrate.

• K: Recall specific facts and events (memory game): Why did the donkey seek a new profession? Which animal was too old to catch mice? Why did the robbers leave the house? Where did each animal sleep?
• K: Review events in the story and make a simple outline.
• K: Re-visualize story scenes, focusing on colors, views, and textures.
• K: Draw a scene from the story.

2. COMPREHENSION activities show understanding of the story by translating it into a slightly different form or restating it in one's own words. Students can explain, identify, put into order, summarize.

• C: Name the animal "singers" in their order of appearance.
• C: Brainstorm adjectives to describe each animal; the robbers; the house.
• C: Explain what happened when the animals "sang" for the robbers.
• C: Arrange pictures of the story scenes into proper order.
• C: Retell this story in your own words (orally or written).

3. APPLICATION activities use the story information in different formats, settings or situations. Students can illustrate, translate, interpret, dramatize, classify, Application level activities still stick fairly closely to the original story material, but students decide where and how to use it.

• AP: Make a map, showing the whole story sequence in a single diagram.
• AP: "Sing" like each of the animals. Act in character like animals or robbers.
• AP: Look up information about each kind of animal, its appearance and behavior. What animals are closely related to it? Make a chart.
• AP: Re-enact this story as an impromptu skit (group); or use finger puppets (individual).
• AP: Retell this story outside of school, for instance to restless siblings on a car trip or to friends at a slumber party.

4. ANALYSIS activities clarify the elements, relationships, and organizational principles within the story, going deeper or beyond explanations provided in it.

• AN: Graph the story's plot (x = time, y = interest) showing episodes, resolutions.
• AN: What did the animals have in common?
• AN: Compare/contrast this story with other cumulative tales.
• AN: Compare the donkey in this story with donkeys in other stories.
• AN: What is each animal's role in the story (voice, behavior, robbers' interpretation)?

5. SYNTHESIS activities produce a new plan, relationship, or communication by rearranging story material plus fresh material. Students can compose, propose, plan, invent, predict, assemble, imagine, design.

• S: Compose a ballad which tells the story to music.
• S: Design a poster advertising the first professional concert of the animal singers.
• S: Retell this story using different but related animals researched above (AP), which live in a different setting or time (burro, coyote, bobcat, and parrot).
• S: Retell the story from the viewpoint of the robbers.
• S: Add a fifth animal singer to the story. What would this animal do when the robber returned to the house, and how would the robber interpret it?
• S: Problem solving: suggest other ways these animals could earn a new living together.
• S: Sequel: Tell the further adventures of these animals together.

6. EVALUATION activities judge the story or the new product, using evidence and criteria (not just personal preference or value). Students can rate, choose, criticize, assess, justify. (Note: Evaluation is not necessarily the highest form of mental activity, but the others have to happen first.)

• E: Take sides, animals against robbers. Who should keep the house? Give reasons or evidence to support your side.
• E: Which character was most important in the story? Why (criteria)?
• E: What makes this story funny? Cite actions, dialogue, misunderstandings.
• E: Evaluate alternative jobs for the animals, suggested above (S), according to criteria such as earning power, availability of the job, etc.

These examples represent each level of activity as clearly and ideally as possible. In fact, though, most activities don't happen exclusively at a single level. Aside from the simplest Knowledge items, most activities also involve "lower" levels of thought. "Compare and contrast," for instance, happens mainly at the Analysis level but uses Knowledge and Comprehension as well.

Therefore, Blooms levels aren't just ordered, they're also cumulative – building upon and including the lower levels. This means, fortunately, that we needn't worry about being experts at Blooms classification. All we want is an estimate of the highest level of mental work a particular follow-up may demand.

Another important point about Blooms is that it's not a developmental progression depending on age or experience. Students of any age can do appropriate work at any of the six levels. Lower levels provide good review and warm-up for any age while the upper levels stretch the mind and imagination of all age groups.

Each level of activity has a different kind of value in the classroom. Knowledge and Comprehension level activities assure the teller that the story was heard. They reinforce "basic thinking skills," which teachers consider especially important for very young or differently-abled students. They review story material as background for higher level activities by all age groups.

Projects at the Knowledge and Comprehension levels can be rewarding for their own sake, such as artwork depicting story scenes, or class rehearsals of story retelling. Good products for sharing also come out of Application level projects, such as the simple skit or (teacher-supervised) research for additional information related to the story characters or setting.

But it is not necessary to stop at the basics. Blooms helped me see that the low level of some follow-ups might explain why I had noticed students getting bored and restless: They had had enough and were ready to go further.

Students enjoy stretching their minds, regardless of age – kindergarten through high school. I love watching the lights come on in Analytical activities which open a new view on things. I love the way Synthesis and Evaluation activities free imagination and energy. But Blooms showed me that it can be a mistake to start at a high level without preparing the groundwork first: This may explain the bewildered faces I used to see when I had gone too fast.

Earlier I listed dozens of specific follow-ups to illustrate the Blooms levels. Such an avalanche doesn't reflect classroom needs. I do in fact use some of these with "The Musicians of Bremen," but rewrote the rest from other favorite stories' follow-ups. For any given story, a few activities would be plenty.

Some books and articles suggest a whole range of activities for each story. We can use Blooms to understand the level of difficulty and the kind of academic value for each suggestion, and make our choices. For example, Dr. Flora Joy [5] has described a detailed series of follow-ups for very young children, based on "The Turnip." Blooms indicates that she reinforced Knowledge and Comprehension in different ways with her many memory game questions and flannel-board exercises. Tasting real turnip and playing a "turnip tug-of-war" game were both Applications of story information to new situations.

Proceeding into the higher levels, the children re-enacted the story as an informal skit. This involved Analysis of plot and character, as well as Comprehension or Application, and if creatively elaborated could reach the Synthesis level as well. A discussion of how big the turnip must be to require so many tuggers was Evaluation.

More typically, however, collections of follow-up ideas give only one or two activities for each story covered. Often they mix quite advanced follow-ups in with some very basic ones. What should we pick, and how can we help assure success instead of student frustration?

Blooms guides us by revealing the underlying structure of each activity. What is the highest level of thought it requires? How complex or difficult is it going to be? Can it be used "as is," or does it presume so many lower levels that students must work up to it gradually?

An excellent example of a high level activity with good lower level preparation appeared in an article by Doug Lipman, where he described how he led fifth graders into writing original "New Tales from Old." [6] By using Blooms to rank the steps, we can see how he guaranteed success for his students.

Blooms classifies creative writing at the Synthesis level, which is quite high. Mr. Lipman did not ask the students to start here. He began by telling the students two variants of the same folktale plot. He had the students list (Knowledge) and sequence (Comprehension) the events of the two stories. Next they compared and contrasted the two (Analysis) to derive a generalized plot. At last, by adding original characters and settings to the plot, they created not only oral, written, and taped stories of their own but also cartoon and play versions.

In effect, Mr. Lipman took the students up the Blooms levels in order, from Knowledge to Synthesis. This successful method can serve as a model for us when we find intriguing high-level activities suggested in the literature (see footnote [7] for some examples) with little direction on how to lead students up to them.

I do similar story-creating exercises with students at all grade levels, varying the model stories to suit student interest and emotional maturity. Young adults respond well to heroic myths, and folktales of love and adventure. They have created some surprisingly sophisticated sequels for mythic heroes[8]: extra exploits for Atalanta prior to her ill-fated race, and additional labors for Hercules or Psyche. Primary grade children like "Gingerbread Man" variants. They have made up oral or illustrated original tales of such runaway items as spare tires, shoes, rocks, and scissors.

In each class we proceed through the lower level exercises at whatever rate suits their readiness. I watch them carefully for signs of boredom - or bewilderment - and skip ahead, or double back, accordingly. The warm-up or preparatory review at the Knowledge and Comprehension levels can be fast, just a sampling of short questions (which will get short answers), or a skeletal outline of key words for each scene. Primary grade children enjoy reinforcing knowledge and comprehension during a story. This, I discovered, is what's happening when they join in with words and gestures. They may need very little additional review before going on.

If, however, it appears were not ready to move into new territory, we can firm the ground under our feet by, for instance: discussing what we know about the hero (Comprehension); comparing/contrasting motifs with material from other stories (Analysis); graphing the plot in order to see its structure (Analysis).

Problem solving is another appealing story follow-up which, Blooms warns us, requires high level thought. Depending on the story, students can provide different answers to riddles and challenges in the story; devise an alternate rescue method; write a whole new coding for the story. Many excellent published sources suggest a variety of interesting problem solving exercises, but rarely indicate how to work up to them.

Blooms indicates that problem solving takes place at the Synthesis and Evaluation level, but depends upon thorough Knowledge, Comprehension and Analysis of the story first. To accomplish these, adapt activities from "Bremen" in the examples above: Review through questions or outline, reinforce understanding of character roles and contributions, analyze plot up to the variable point.

Older students excel at problem solving, but younger students can do it too; remember, the Blooms sequence is not developmental. Even kindergartners, after hearing "The Old Woman and Her Pig," can quickly work up to suggesting alternate ways to get that pig over the fence in time for dinner: cut the fence, dig under it, ask the butcher to hand the pig safely over, set up trampolines on both sides and bounce over, hire a hot air balloon…

Of course, the story always comes first. When I can visit each class several times, I prefer to start by just "feeding them up" on stories. In this media age, people are so hungry for storytelling that we must satisfy their appetite before we can ask them to care about the gourmet subtleties of a follow-up!

Selection of the stories suitable for each age group is of course a matter of the teller's taste plus experience and intuition. Kieran Egan's Educational Development [9] has helped me understand how the emotional and learning-style needs of different age groups affect their story preferences. Teachers sometimes request stories from particular ethnic sources or stories on particular themes; these stories can enrich the curriculum by themselves.

Not all stories lend themselves to good follow-up activities at every level of Blooms. Cumulative and chain-logic tales invite excellent review of basic sequencing (Knowledge, Comprehension). "Pourquoi" legends suggest research (Application) into the scientific account of the natural phenomenon; science may tell "how," but stories still tell "why." Traditional foods [10] or folk arts (carding, spinning) play a key role in some folktales: try them in class (Application). Convoluted European folktales provide interesting material for Analysis. Adventures contain problems begging alternate solutions (Synthesis). Plots which hinge on disputes lead to good alternate viewpoint retellings (Synthesis) or "taking sides" exercises (Evaluation).

There are important exceptions to the general value of follow-up activities. Stories of deep emotional impact should be left alone, to germinate in the listener's heart in their own time. Such stories should not be rehashed, dissected, juggled about. It is a delicate problem: I don't like to shock students out of the meditation they need by sending them straight to recess or math period: yet a group follow-up activity could be just as disruptive. To fill the time with quiet, I may suggest a private project such as sketching (art or word) pictures of story images For some stories, related music or a song can ease the transition. Jane Yolen's poignant "Greyling" [11] for instance, settles softly with the eerie beauty of the original Scots ballad.[12]

Perhaps claims for the academic value of storytelling sound like attempts to "buy time" for an art form which should be appreciated for its own sake. It is always a privilege, as well as a pleasure, to come into a busy classroom to share the ancient, ever-new art of storytelling with new listeners Activities like these help teachers to justify taking class time for the storytellers visit.

Furthermore, follow-up activities can also encourage teachers to add storytelling to their own repertoire of teaching skills. As much as I love coming to their classrooms, I would like even more to see the storytelling continue long after I am gone. An emphasis on "curriculum enrichment through storytelling" seems to help.

Dr. Blooms Taxonomy has helped me to select, adapt and use follow-up activities so that they fit the story and the students, and make an academic contribution as well. I hope you will find "Blooms" equally helpful.

[1] Bloom, Benjamin S., et al, Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: Handbook I: Cognitive Domain. New York : David McKay Co., 1956

[2] Find books under GIFTED EDUCATION in the library's Subject catalog; then check the books' indexes for references to "Bloom, B.S." For instance: Barbara Clark's Growing Up Gifted. 2nd ed. Columbus: Charles E. Merrill Co., 1983. 219-222

[3] Most of these examples were suggested by or derived from ideas which appear in multiple sources: As Anansi learned, "Wisdom can be found everywhere." I would like, however, to acknowledge the following as especially useful:

• Geisler, Harlynne, "51 Classroom Activities to Follow Up the Storyteller's Visit" (available from her for $3, 4182-J Mount Alifan Pl, Sand Diego, CA 92111)
• Lipson, Greta B. and Max Morrison, Fact, Fantasy and Folklore: expanding language arts and critical thinking skills (Good Apple, Inc., Box 299 Carthage, Ill. 62321, 1977). Story synopses and activities for upper elementary through college; many higher level activities.
• Mealy, Virgina, More Than A Story Hour (BookLures Inc., P.O. Box 9450, O'Fallon, MO 63366, 1983, page 20). Varied activities with story references. BookLures also has books to use with tall tales, science fiction.

[4] Grimm, Jakob and Willhelm, eds., "The Bremen Town Musicians" in Grimm's Fairy Tales. Garden City: Nelson Doubleday, 1954, and many other editions. An alternate title is "The Traveling Musicians."

[5] Joy, Flora, "Storytelling: the Classroom Challenge" National Storytelling Journal, Winter 1984, page 26

[6] Lipman, Doug, "New Tales from Old" National Storytelling Journal, Summer 1984, page 11.

[7] Crosby, Nina E. & Elizabeth H. Martin, Don't Teach – Let Me Learn About: mysteries, myths, fairy tales, etc. Buffalo: DOK Publishers, 1982. Baried projects in activity card format, to go with general story types. No references.
Lipson, Greta B. and Maxter, Morrison, op cit.
Mealy, Virginia op cit.

[8] Hamilton, Edith, Mythology (many editions). Well-researched outlines of classical Greek myths for retelling; includes Atalanta's childhood and heroic exploits.

[9] Egan, Kieran, Educational development. New York: Oxford University Press, 1979. Stages of emotional development which motivate learning; appropriate use of stories in teaching curriculum content.

[10] Morrow, Leslie M., "Stories Good Enough to Eat." Instructor Aug. 1983 pp. 22-25. Book references and good recipes, most of them quite relevant to the stories.

[11] Yolen, Jane. Greyling. World Publications, 1968.

[12] "The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry" in Child's English and Scottish Popular Ballads. Recorded by Joan Baez on Vanguard Records.