Please visit the Favorite Poem Project, and hear Americans read the poetry they love.

Submission Guidelines:

In this category, you not only write a story, you tell it out loud and record yourself. Your submission will be an audio file or video file of you telling your story. You do not have to appear on camera, if you'd rather make a video that shows pictures while you tell the story. Speak clearly so that each word can be understood. The judge will not be looking at a written version of your story -- he or she will only have the sound of your voice to help him or her grasp the content. Submissions should not be more than 3 minutes long. You can submit your file on a data or music CD with your entry form taped to the front, or you can host your file online and fill out an entry form to tell us where to find it.

Acceptable video formats include the following: .avi .mov .wmv .mpg .mpeg .swf

Acceptable audio formats include the following: .aif .wav .mp3 .mid

Teaching This Genre:

Being a good storyteller involves not only the construction of a good tale, but also elements of public speaking like eye contact and vocal modulation. Maybe you'd like to develop a different accent or voice to represent each of the characters in your story, to make it more interesting. You definitely want to speak clearly

Listen to Robert Munsch tell his stories: http://www.storyteller.net/news/2008/05/540/

This site is full of storytelling info http://www.storyteller.net/

Handbook on how to tell stories http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ramseyil/storyhandbook.htm

Listen to online stories http://storynory.com/

Page of good links on how to tell stories http://42explore.com/story.htm

Software to allow you to record your story: Audacity is free, open source software for recording and editing sounds. It is available for Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, GNU/Linux, and other operating systems. http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

A video by and about Bobby Norfolk, professional story teller: