- Home
- Ida Globocnik
Ida Globocnik
Story Seeds: Let’s Grow Together
Audience focus:
- All audiences
Abstract
Why We Tell Stories – Reflections from The Giving Tree
I have been telling stories in English classrooms for more than twenty years. Over time, I have learned that storytelling is not about performance or perfection, but about presence. It is about what happens when a teacher dares to slow down, to trust a story and to bring something of themselves into the telling.
This workshop grows out of my long relationship with Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree. I have told this story to different learners, in different countries, at different moments of my own life—and each time, the story has told me something back. In this session, I share not only how I tell the story, but why I tell it and how my understanding of it has changed alongside my teaching.
Participants will experience the story first-hand, as listeners. From there, we will gently step back and reflect on the invisible mechanics of storytelling: voice, pauses, repetition, emotional tension, and the power of what is left unsaid. These theoretical elements are always anchored in lived classroom moments—small decisions, unexpected reactions, and the quiet exchanges that never appear in lesson plans.
The workshop has a strong personal thread, but it is also deeply practical. I will share concrete examples of good practice gathered over years of teaching—moments that worked, moments that failed, and moments that surprised me. Teachers will leave with adaptable storytelling strategies, classroom-ready ideas, and, perhaps most importantly, renewed confidence in their own voice as storytellers.
This is an invitation to reflect on storytelling not just as a pedagogical tool, but as a human act—one that allows language learning to become meaningful, memorable and deeply felt.
Biography
I am a dedicated English and German teacher with over 20 years of experience working with secondary school students aged 14 to 18. My work extends beyond the classroom, involving all age groups through community and international projects, including Erasmus+ and eTwinning. I coordinated a student exchange with a Hungarian gymnasium for 10 years, involving over 500 students. This year is going to be the second year that I am organising a student exchange with Bavarian students. I have led numerous workshops for English and German teachers at both local and national levels, and regularly organize lectures and events for international visitors, fostering intercultural learning and collaboration across educational sectors.
