Everyone likes a well-told story. It satiates our desire for curiosity, is usually entertaining and offers a strong emotional connection. In early childhood, stories work well as powerful cognitive tools that help shape the child’s worldview, open up avenues for them to engage with peers and express themselves. Stories are a critical part of children in ages 2-6 learning and open up paths to skills such as broader understanding, stronger communication skills and a sharper sense of creativity. Story-led learning helps build the foundations of academic skills and aids in overall growth by building confidence, sparking curiosity, and allowing the child to interact well with others.

At the fundamental level, story-led learning uses stories to teach children in the age group of 2-6 major concepts, ideas, and experiences, baked into the natural linear structure that stories offer. The stories are the canvas where new knowledge is gained, more profound insights into lived experiences are sought, and imagination is nurtured. They help children make critical connections, ask questions and seek meaningful responses, which allows them to participate in learning. It also helps them engage with characters and events at an emotional level, helping them become kinder and empathetic to the world at large.

Express yourself

Young learners tend to lack confidence and are often unsure of expressing their feelings. Story-led learning shifts the focus from finding the correct answers to understanding the wider message. It involves open-ended questions and deeper conversations about the stories, which help create safe spaces where educators feel heard and valued. The educators leading these sessions can also participate and place themselves as fellow learners. It eliminates performance anxiety and helps build the child’s confidence.

It plays a vital role in improving communication skills and creates multiple opportunities for conversation. Children can work with each other, have discussions in pairs, participate in group storytelling activities and reflective sharing sessions where they learn concepts such as taking turns, listening actively, and so on. Children use language as the medium to build imagination, enquire and negotiate with peers. Storytelling allows them to pick up sharp language skills, improve vocabulary, and understand and express emotions. Through art, music, and role play, children can find fresh avenues to communicate their ideas, which is vital for language development.

Making them creative

Stories help improve imagination, challenge the way things are and are usually an invitation for children to think beyond what is. When children offer an alternate ending to a tale or a new storyline for a character they relate to, they are bringing in original thought and problem-solving skills. Moreover, inquiry-based learning is found within stories. For instance, a story about rain can be used as a prop to delve deeper into the water cycle with hands-on experiments or shadow puppetry. Thus, the child is not taught in a linear question-and-answer format. It allows them to look deeper, discover more nuance, ask essential questions, and explore real-world phenomena. It helps them form sharper hypotheses, study outcomes, and apply conclusions.

Meanwhile, neuroscience research says storytelling remains very important. When children are emotionally engaged via stories, multiple areas of the brain light up, including language, sensory, motor, and emotional centres, which means the children experience the story. The stories activate mirror neurons, which develop skills such as empathy and repeated narrations, which help improve memory and language retention.

Each on their own pace

A story-led classroom does not believe in the one-size-fits-all solution. The goal of this method is to recognise each child’s growth trajectory and celebrate it, instead of pushing everything into an academically focused ranking. This allows educators to assess each learner on their progress and strengths. For instance, shy students can be nudged to talk about one minor incident within the story, while a more confident child could be encouraged to expand on the story.

This helps both students sharpen skills, learn more, and succeed.

Stories can help bake in cross-curricular integration, mixing basic reading, maths, music, movement, and interpersonal skills. It makes learning meaningful and applicable to everyday experiences.

Among children in the age group of 2-6 years, story-led learning must be the way forward and not just restricted to words in a manual. It respects the natural curiosity of children, celebrates their voices, and offers them the tools to imagine, articulate, and grow. With the help of stories, children can become better learners and also become confident communicators, creative thinkers, and empathetic individuals, keen to take on the world, one story at a time.

(The author is CEO, Pre-K Division Kangaroo Kids)