One of my favorite activities with my children is telling bedtime stories. It’s a fun time for us to connect and use our imaginations together. It’s also a way to help my children build their own storytelling skills.

If you’re new to bedtime story telling, I’ve got some tricks to help keep your stories on track and make them interactive by giving your kids the opportunity to tell them with you.

My background is in improv comedy where I made up a lot of stories on the spot. One of the tools I’ve used to teach storytelling to improv students is the Story Spine and it works great for bedtime stories. The Story Spine was created by Kenn Adams in his book How to Improvise a Full Length Play.

The purpose of the Story Spine is to help keep your story on track as you advance through the steps of a story. The Story Spine gives you the beginning of each sentence and you fill in the rest.

The Story Spine
Once upon a time…
And every day…
Until one day…
And because of that…
And because of that…
And because of that…
Until finally…
And every since that day…

How To Get Started
I suggest printing out the steps of the Story Spine and pinning them on the wall in your child’s bedroom. This will help you and your child learn the steps until it becomes natural for you both. I’ve made a PDF of the Story Spine here that you can print out.

There are lots of variations of how you can use the story spine. Here are some suggestions:

Tell a Story TO Your Child
Get a suggestion from your child to help spark your imagination. I often ask for a animal then plug the suggestion into the Story Spine and tell a story.

Here is an example:

Suggestion - raccoon

Once upon a time there was a raccoon named Bart.
And everyday Bart would sneak around the neighborhood climbing in people’s trash cans looking for something good to eat.
Until one day when Bart opened a trash can and found a cookbook.
And because of that Bart read the cookbook.
And because of that Bart learned to cook.
And because of that Bart invited all of his friends over for a dinner party so they could try the wonderful food he’d cooked.
Until finally his friends told him his food was so good that he should open a restaurant.
And every since that day if you go down to the corner where the big oak tree is, you can order a meal cooked by a raccoon named Bart.

Tell a Story WITH Your Child
After you’ve told a few stories to your child, you can get them to help you tell one. When it’s there turn prompt them with the Story Spine and have them fill in the blank.

I like to start off by saying “Once upon a time there was a…” and look at my child to get them to fill in the blank. Then I say the next line of the story by myself. Then when there turn comes again I prompt them by saying “Until one day..”. We go back and forth like that until the story is told.

Have Your Child Tell The Story
You can prompt your kids with the beginning of each line and they fill in the rest of the sentence. Before you know it, they are telling their own stories.

Tell a Story as a Group
If you have more than one kid or another grownup around, you can tell the story as a group. Each person telling the next line of the story.

Tips
There are no real rules to this game. The Story Spine is there to provide guidance. Modify it as you see fit. The point is to have fun, enjoy creating a story, and connect with your kids.

Sometime when I am telling a story, my kids will sometimes say something like “No, he doesn’t ride on the bus, he flies an airplane.” When they do, I change the story to match whatever they say. Them changing your lines of the story is a stepping stone to telling their own stories. Roll with it.

Kids love it when you incorporate one of their stuffed animals into the story. If you do, remember to treat that character with respect and don’t let anything too scary happen to it.

If you have a Mac, you can type the story into Text Edit and choose “Speech” from the edit menu to have the mac speak the story out loud. At my house this leads to huge giggle fits.

Things To Say When You Are Coaching Your Kids
It’s important when coaching kids to tell stories that they feel successful. If you criticize what they say, it will take the fun out of the game and make them resistant to participating. In the beginning, resist the urge to correct their contributions to the story and celebrate that they participated.

Here are things I say to encourage my kids during story telling:

You can’t be wrong.

Whatever you say is right, we’re just making it up.

I liked the part about the _____________.

Say whatever comes to your mind.

Good job!

Let Me Hear From You!
If you try the Story Spine, I’d love to hear from you about how it went and what you learned.

Next time, I’ll tell you about my other favorite bedtime story game called What Do You Do?