Shiny Green Button

Via Best Green Blogs, I found this remarkable site—Ecological Tales for Environmental Education—that uses traditional stories to teach children in India about the environment. The most recent series of posts focuses on honey gatherers, describing how various tribes have long gone about harvesting honey from local forests.

The blog features artwork, embeds video and even offers lesson plans to help teachers bring these stories into the classroom. The blog is maintained by Muriel Kakani, an author and illustrator who has traveled throughout India discovering its ecological traditions.

Beyond the fascinating content, I was taken by the premise of the site. Using stories to make complex information more accessible and meaningful is a common technique. But what I love about this site is how Kakani uses colorful illustrations to make her stories more active and vibrant, setting a richer mood and suggesting larger meaning without being heavy handed.

It’s a reminder (for me, at least) that effective storytelling isn’t necessarily about the quality of the writing. It’s about engaging the imagination and prompting an emotional response, often by translating big events or ideas or challenges into human scale.

As I tackle my assignments each day, it’s easy to get caught up in the mechanics of writing clear messages and concise copy. And for some purposes and some audiences, that’s what’s needed. But there are times when the most on-target message or technically sound copy falls flat. Rather than automatically diving into revisions, I think that’s a sign to take a step back and instead consider other ways—even other media—that go beyond communicating information to telling a story that resonates as authentic and true.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 10th, 2009 at 3:57 pm and is filed under Communications, Odd and other. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.