The Storyline approach and On-line learning design

The Storyline approach was developed by Steve Bell, Sallie Harkness and Fred Rendell some years ago at the Department of Education of the University of Strathclyde in Scotland. It places the teacher as a facilitator who designs learning opportunities using the wealth of information resources available within the context of a story. Learners develop their own learning, both through guided group-work and independent research. The groups get together with the results of their research and collectively construct a story. The thread that links the research and the learning is in fact the development of a story. This is powerful stuff. The learning is entirely self-motivated and the system encourages the development of information gathering and processing skills. In other words it is a system that promotes information literacy skills. The Storyline approach has been actively proposed by Teaching and Learning Scotland and is gradually being introduced throughout the land from pre-primary unto secondary school.

Another interesting thing about this approach is that it is extremely similar to the educational design underpinning the development of online learning where the design team constructs learning opportunities that encourage self-learning through independent inquiry. Discussion boards are then used to share results of research and to develop the learning of the group as a whole. The groups are motivated through the construction of a story. An example of such an implementation can be seen in the Hospiweb Project where students from 2 universities were asked to develop an investment strategy for a new business hotel venture in Scotland. each team was therefore constructing the story of their own imaginary business venture. The parallels with Sotryline are amazing, becuase within the Hospiweb Porject, we had parents contacting the team, inquiring whether their sons and daughters were indeed asked to create a business venture for real. there was excitement and awe combined with fear...

This is yet another application of storytelling. Who would have thought of storytelling entering the corporate world...? and yet, we have all encountered with a sense of amazement the stories of innovators and business men who against all odds, followed their dreams, and found riches, fame and glory for themselves and their countries.... the images are indeed mythical . Have a look at the stories of Akio Morita, the founder of the Sony Corporation, or the Asa Griggs Candler, the founder of CocaCola or Ray Krok the founder of McDonalds. They are all recounted using the macro-structure of children's folk stories.
What a wonder, that we never are tired of listening to stories.