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Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Bill, Hi there. Welcome to the biz communication Show. I’m your host, Bill Lampton, the biz communication guy, bringing you tips and strategies that will boost your business. And it’s not only tips and strategies coming from me, but I have the great honor and privilege of hosting a guest who has a distinguished communication career, and from our conversation, you will get tips and strategies that will absolutely jet propel your business. Our guest today on the biz communication show is Karen Chase, coming to us from East Freetown, Massachusetts. Karen Chase is an award winning storyteller, teaching artist, workshop leader and author since 2002 She has taught the art of storytelling to over 700 students. Karen is a contributing author to numerous publications around the world, and her book, story by story creating a student storytelling troupe received a 2016 storytelling world Honor Award and a 2015 Anne Izzard storytelling award. Karen Chase produces and hosts the story cafe, a local television series, and is the recipient of the lanes brother blue Ruth Hill storytelling award in 2009 and the 2011 national storytelling networks, Article service and leadership award. Obviously, we’re talking with an expert today. Hello, Karen, welcome. Hello
Karen Chace
bill. Thank you so much. I’m always honored to be on your show well
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
as you and I know this is probably your fifth or sixth appearance, and I warn you, I’ll invite you again, because you always bring quality recommendations and insights to me and to our guests, those who are watching and those who are listening to the podcast today, Karen, I want us to explore a program that you instituted. It’s called Bridging the generations. First of all, tell us what prompted you to to start this program.
Karen Chace
Well, I was a storytelling teacher for many years, working with students in my region using folktales and fairy tales, myths and legends, to help them with their public speaking skills and also connect with the Massachusetts curriculum. And you know, one day my son was he was 38 now, he was around 1011, years old. At the time, we were looking through a photo album, and there was this beautiful picture of this stunning woman, very kind of a pin up pose. And it was sepia tones, so it was definitely an older picture. And he said to me, who is that woman? And I said, that’s your grandmother. And at the time, she was probably in her late 50s, early 60s, and of course, still a stunning woman, but she looked different. And it got me thinking, children, do not realize that the elders in their lives have had many lives before they were their grandparents. And so I started thinking about connecting my storytelling students with local senior citizens, or how my colleague Andrea and I like to refer to them, those enriched by age. And so that’s how it was born. I reached out to my colleague, Andrea, and I said, I have this idea for a program once upon a generation, would you join me? And she jumped right in with both feet. And that’s how it began.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Well, bridging the generations, okay, that’s where you got the idea, interestingly enough, from your own family. That’s right. Well, what happens in this program? Describe what goes on.
Karen Chace
Well, we use my storytelling students, first of all, to connect with local senior citizens. Is because of the reason behind that is because my storytelling students already have the skills they need to tell, not read, but tell a story, because they’ve gone through my program. They know the, you know, the art of oral tradition and how to present a story effectively with, you know, vocal intonation, facial expression, gestures, body language, but they’re using tails and fairy tales. This is a little different. It’s personal narrative. So what we first do is we find seniors in our community. We have a couple of information set, informational meetings, explaining the program, we do a lot of PR to gather seniors and those that sign up. We it’s a 12 week program once a week, and they start with a three, three workshops, just the seniors, not the students, and they
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
what happens in those workshops? Well, they come to us with
Karen Chace
either a story they already want to share or a couple of ideas. And when we gather Andrea and I offer many story prompts to start eliciting memory. And then once they have a story, and it’s it’s not their life story. It’s a story from their life. So we’re talking about maybe a story that can be shared within a five minute window. And we help them write their story. We use different worksheets I’ve devised to help them break their story down, add, you know, sensory elements to their story, that sort of thing. And after the three weeks are done with the seniors and they have their story, then we meet with the storytelling students and we pair them up, you know, one student with one senior, or sometimes it’s two students with one senior, and the seniors share their story, and the students interview them for more information, and then the seniors go away for seven weeks, and we work specifically with the students, helping them learn that story. They use a lot of literary license and get that story in their bones. And then we invite the seniors back to listen to the story and correct any major mistakes, not something minor, but major. So you invite
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
them back, and let’s say this, the senior listens to this young person who’s going to tell the story and and they they check the accuracy and check how they could improve it. Is that right? Correct?
Karen Chace
Correct? Now, if it’s something minor, like saying the story, somebody was wearing a blue dress, but the dress color is not important to the story, and the student says a red dress, well, we don’t correct that, but it was something really specific that makes a difference to the story. Well, the senior will gently, you know, offer that
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
want something accurate and relevant, correct,
Karen Chace
correct. And we asked the seniors to work on a story from the time they were maybe five years old to the time they were around 50 years old. And the reason for that is because we are trying to impart to the students what things used to be like, before remote controls, before cell phones, before streaming TV, that sort of thing, and give them a perspective of the way life used to be.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
This is, this is quite eye opening for the students who today wouldn’t know why there was a hole in the wall to plug a phone in.
Karen Chace
Exactly in fact, last year, one of my students was telling a story, and in the story, there was a television. And and this while he was practicing, he reached his hand out and went like that. And I said, What is that gesture? And he said, That’s the remote control. I said, no remote controls back then, you know. So we look for that kind of accuracy. And then, of course, they’re amazed that there’s, there were no remote controls at one time. And then once that is done, we and the seniors hear the story, we meet with the students one more time just to polish up a few things. And then we offer two public performances, one in Freetown, where I live in, another in Lakeville, which is the next town over, because that is part of our school region. So we have students from both towns, and I have our local cable film come and film, and so we can put it on the local cable channel, and everybody gets to see the the performance. It’s really quite wonderful. It’s. Just amazing to see the connections that have been made between the seniors and the students over the years.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Well, not only that, as you’ve indicated, it’s something of a life history lesson for the young people. And I think, for example, one of the thoughts I’ve had over the past decade or so is as much Karen, as life has changed and business has changed in the last 20 years. I wonder, I don’t know about you, but I wonder, can it change that much in the next 20 years? And one thing that I like so much about your program is that, for me, I was a history major in college, but for many of us, reading history is it’s sometimes a cure for insomnia. But when, when history comes through other people’s stories, not only do the young people remember that, but they feel it, and they it’s an education well beyond books, Okay? Well, during the performance, the the student tells the story, and the the senior that they, that student was connected with, is present when it’s being told.
Karen Chace
Absolutely they are not only present, but one of the things we asked the seniors to do is to bring in one or two pictures associated with the story. They wrote a picture of themselves during that time of the story. And perhaps, if it’s like at a summer camp, do they have a picture of the summer camp? And we have while the student is telling we have a slideshow in the back, and we put up the the name of the story, the name of the senior, and the pictures that go along with the story, so the audience can actually relate and see what was taking place, what that senior looked like during their during that time in their life. And at the end of the performance, the both senior and students receive an award. This the seniors receive a mentor Award, and the students receive a bridging the generations award, and they come up together and receive those awards, and so the audience can once again see the two together. It’s a wonderful culmination of the evening where everybody gets to to share and seeing everyone connected.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Do the does a student and that student’s senior? Do they both get a recording of the story that’s been told? They
Karen Chace
can, they can receive a recording from the local cable company. Absolutely,
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
I just, I just picture this as as an emotional event, to not just an intellectual event, not just a learning event, but for both participants, the students and the senior citizens, certainly, many of us past 50 enjoy looking back. And then the students get to, as I’ve already indicated, they get to not just read about, but they get to sense the past, don’t
Karen Chace
they absolutely and and the connections that are made are invaluable. Um, normally we switch up because I we have seniors that have been with us from the very beginning in 2016 and so we don’t pair them with the same student every year. It depends on the story. We understand the student’s personality, and so based on the story that’s, you know, how we’ll connect them with the senior. If it, you know, is a more quieter story, if the student has to be a more quiet personality, well, then they’ll have a story like that and so forth. However, at the second year, I had two students who were in fifth grade. They had started with me in storytelling in the fourth grade, and they came into the Once Upon a generation program is invitation only, and I invited them to join. They were two pieces of pod, these boys, and they always did tandem storytelling together, and we matched them up with one of our seniors, and they told his story in tandem together. And there was such a strong connection between all three of them that we have never separated them. They always are paired together. And in fact, those two boys are now senior, excuse me, freshmen in college, and they are coming back this year via zoom to work with their senior again. That’s how strong their connection is. They will be back in time out of college for the performances. So they will be there live, but they will work on the story with Pat via zoom, you
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
have created lasting you’ve created lasting bonds. There they
Karen Chace
they refer to him as you know, one of their grandfathers, and in fact, one of the boys wrote his college thesis about this program and how it had impacted him.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
That’s a that’s a terrific project there, Karen, I want to explore with you, what are some of those, the most fascinating stories that have emerged from this? I’m sure you can give us a couple of examples. We’ll be back in just a few seconds for that. Do
Michael Stewart
you wish you felt confident about giving speeches. Do you want to deal with difficult people constructively? And what about becoming more persuasive in sales? Then keep listening now to Dr Bill Lambton. He spent 20 years in management, so he knows the communication skills you need for success. I urge you to call the biz communication guy today for a no cost, but very valuable, 30 minute discussion about your communication challenges. Call now, 678-316-4300, again, that’s 678-316-4300,
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Karen, I mentioned to you that in my training of organizations and corporations, I conduct an exercise fairly similar to the one that you do, only it’s done all at one time. And I call this what’s unique about you. And I have the group divide up into tables, and they tell each other, and they’ve got about a minute to do it, what is unique about themselves. And then I have them come back and tell the entire group. And what’s so rewarding about this is that there are times when I’m working with a group that may have worked together for 10 or 15 years, they think they know each other, but when these stories start coming out and I I remember some fascinating samples. I remember, and this was long before 911 I remember one participant in the group who stood up and said that she had been a flight attendant, and her commercial flight had been hijacked to Cuba, and she was held there for a couple of days. I remember, of course, some very unusual ones. One, one person said that long ago, he was walking a beach in Massachusetts and saw Robert John and Ted Kennedy Wow on the beach. And another one had the hobby. Some of these stick in my mind. Another one had the hobby of riding the tallest roller coasters across the US. So I’ve found this such a valuable it’s a great icebreaker, because I didn’t know that about you. So what are some of the stories that just light up the room that you can remember.
Karen Chace
Well, it’s interesting, because sometimes people who talk to us about this program think that the stories have to be really big, big historical stories. And, you know, I and that’s wonderful. But some of the smaller slices of life that they would think, Oh, that’s too mundane. I don’t want to share. That turn out to be some of the most touching and thoughtful stories. For instance, a couple of years ago, we had a woman join us for the first time, and she came with two story ideas, and one was very historical. She was happened to be the first woman on this particular submarine. We’re like, well, that’s amazing. And then she had another story about picking dandelions with her grandmother, which she had already written. And of course, you know, you weigh those two. But we had her read the dandelion one to us, and it was so full of warmth and emotion and love that we said, this has to be the story. It is. It was publishable. It was that well done. And she told us she couldn’t believe how much we loved her writing. And she said when she was a young girl and had written an essay in. School, her teacher had called her up to the front of the class and admonished her writing and tore up her essay in front of everyone. And since that time in grammar school, she had never written, and she came out with this gorgeous story. So what a gift she gave to us, and it turned out that it sparked her writing again. So something a little slice of life can be just as powerful. On the other end of the spectrum, we had a gentleman come in, and he had two stories he wanted to he was thinking about, and one was about his cat. And we were, well, it was, it was a recent story. So we said, would you have anything you know, older when you were growing up. And he said, Well, you know, I do remember taking a train ride with my friend and, well, on the surface, that didn’t seem really interesting the more he spoke, and he told us that his friend was African American. He was white, and at the time, this was during the civil rights movement. So it was, it was not, you know the usual thing, I was risky. It was very risky, um, and they, he, his friend said to him, you want to, would you like to come in a train ride with me for the day? And he didn’t really know where they were going, but he said, Sure. They were off on an adventure they were like in their late teens. So they could go off on their own, 1819, and he ended up being in Washington listening to Martin Luther King give his, I Have a Dream speech.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Oh, what? What accidental, or was it providential timing? Oh, it
Karen Chace
was. It was unbelievable. And then the more we spoke to the man, you know, we found out that he was in the midst of, you know, when the riots happened and the tanks were in the streets, and that he actually had also performed with Peter, Paul and Mary. He played guitar, he said. So this man had this amazing life. This is a story you need to tell. And so we paired him up with one of my storytellers that I had known for many years. However you talk about what’s unique about me, I didn’t know she was a singer, and she went by the nickname cookie, and we paired her with Rick. And come to find out, when Rick was a singer, he had a partner named cookie, and and the students at the time were just learning about the Civil Rights in history in Martin Luther King. And so he came in one day when we were meeting with the students with his guitar, and he played the song, we shall overcome. Oh my and it was quite moving. And right then and there, Andrea and I decided this is what we’re going to do during the performance, we placed cookie last to share her story, and after she finished the story, Rick got up from the audience with his guitar, walked up playing cookie, started singing, we shall overcome, as did Rick. And then one by one, we had the seniors and the students come up, end up on stage all singing together. I still get chills. You everybody in the place was singing. It was a full house. It was one of the most moving experiences I’ve ever had in my life. In we could have had a cat story instead, but we had that story.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
I get chills hearing about that, and I use the word accidental or providential meeting there. There are a number of times in my life when I happen to connect with somebody for the first time, and it it almost seems providential, whatever your whatever your faith or non faith, I think you can, you can identify with the fact that I believe Wayne Dyer was one who often said, there are no accidents in the universe. And that doesn’t mean we are. We are bound to have things happen. But if we are alert and we’re open, it’s amazing what can happen.
Karen Chace
Absolutely.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Karen, we’re going to have to pull it together here. What I’d like to ask you is summarize for us briefly. First, what are the benefits for the student participants. And what are the benefits? The takeaways, we might say for the senior citizen participants,
Karen Chace
well, for the students, there’s a few. The obvious one is connecting with another generation in learning about history in real time, which is much more powerful, and then also from the performance standpoint, it’s another way to engage with the public and use their public speaking skills that they have learned through storytelling and connect with the audience. And you know, they take the. That those skills and use them in other ways. You know, for instance, you know, a college interview or a job interview, a presentation you know in class. So those are some of the benefits for the seniors. It’s very enriching for them to feel that they are no longer isolated from the younger generation, that the younger generation feels that what they have to share is important when when COVID and the shutdown happened, what we ended up doing was making sure we even though we couldn’t meet in person, Andrea, my colleague, taught all the seniors how to use Zoom, and we continued the program on Zoom, because the seniors were so isolated, as was everybody, but I think it was more detrimental to them, and so it was another way of Staying connected when things were a little haywire at the time, they they feel valued. The seniors feel valued, and they should
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
when you and I were discussing what topic we might cover today in our conversation, and I like to call it a conversation more than an interview when we were bouncing around a couple of topics. This one just absolutely jumped out at me. I think it’s, it’s bridging an important gap, both for the very young people and for those more advanced in in years. It’s, just, it’s something that doesn’t happen unless we we make it happen. And how many years has this been going on? We began in 2016
Karen Chace
so it’s been we only had the, you know, semi pause during the pandemic. And this year we have 11 students, and we have nine seniors, and so some of the students will tell in tandem. So it has expanded. We started out with four seniors, so you can see how over the years, sadly, we have lost some seniors since we’ve begun, but new seniors have, you know, come into the program?
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Well, I commend you. I think it’s it’s an exciting program, and I know those who have watched our conversation and those who’ve listened on the podcast feel uplifted by it, feel a great sense of gratitude for for what you and your colleagues have done, and you mentioned Andrea a couple of times. Tell us a little bit about Andrea who works with you. Andrea
Karen Chace
Lovett is a storyteller in Abington, Massachusetts. She has probably 10 years more experience on me. She is also an award winning storyteller and an amazing colleague to work with. I tend to lean more towards the folk tale, fairy tales, part of World tradition. She does, but she works a lot in personal narrative, you know, personal stories. And so we were, you know, a perfect combination to get together. We finish each other’s sentences. We get along very, very well. And it’s a blessing to have her as a colleague and a friend. Thank
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
you for that clarification. I know there are those who would love to get in touch with you. Story bug, which is your moniker, so give us your contact information, please. My email
Karen Chace
is my name, Karen [email protected], [email protected] and my website is storybug.net,
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
and let’s clarify the spelling of Chase. Yes,
Karen Chace
it is, C, H, A, C, E,
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
thank you. Thank you. And I know our viewers and listeners will want to get in touch with you, and now that you’ve given your contact information, I’m happy to give mine. I invite our viewers and listeners to go to my my YouTube channel, which is Bill Lambton PhD, I’ve been recording instructional videos on YouTube 10, since 2007 more than 500 videos on communication. Some of them were solo presentations, but in recent years, through the biz communication show, I’ve been able to bring you not only my insights on communication, but those of others as well. And while you’re there, I invite you on my YouTube channel to hit the subscribe button my website, because I’m the biz communication guy, quite logically, my website is biz communication guy.com and there’s a subscribe option there you can. Subscribe to this podcast. I certainly invite those of you who would like to describe your communication challenges and problems, discuss those with me and a no obligation. Introductory phone call. Give me a call, please. 678-316-4300,
again, that’s 678-316-4300,
Karen Chase, C, H, A, C, E, thank you. How would you pull together in a half minute or a minute? What you want to leave with the audience about bridging the generations.
Karen Chace
Well, we always say at our performance that there is an African quote that we share when an elder dies, a library burns down, it is so important to gather those stories while those you love and cherish are still with you. Whether it’s something in a setting like what’s fun a generation or it’s around your kitchen table, please make sure you ask those questions before those you love are gone.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Yes, and as you’ve indicated, we we’re not well. Let’s put it this way, positively, we’ve advanced beyond the Neanderthal age, where news our family items were passed down by word of mouth. Only we do word of mouth now, but we can record it. We can transcribe it. We can have video and audio and written records of it, and I join you in encouraging families to do that wonderful.
Karen Chace
It’s such a gift for everyone.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
I want to thank again. Karen Chase, our stimulating and highly informative guest. Thanks to those of you who joined us on the biz communication Show. I’m your host, Bill Lambton, the biz communication guy, inviting you to be with us for the next edition of the biz communication show you.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
