National Youth Storytelling Showcase

This worthy event is a national competition of young (school age) storytellers held in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee during the Smoky Mountain Storytelling Festival in the month of February.

To participate you will need to go to the NYSS site to print out their forms. Fill them out and send them to me (if you are a resident of Pennsylvania) along with a VHS or DVD of a five to ten minute performance.

My address is:

Charles B. Kiernan - NYSS PA

4458 Coffeetown Road

Schnecksville, PA 18078

From all the entries sent to me, I and a committee made up of Lehigh Valley Storytelling Guild members will select five entries to be forwarded to the national level. There are five entries allowed from each state. From this pool eighteen to twenty contestant will be chosen to compete at Pigeon Forge. These will be divided into three age groups. There will be awards for each age group, plus a Grand Champion.

Awards are all well and good, but the real value is in the sharing of the experience of telling at a festival, taking part in workshops and the comradary of the other young tellers. Both my daughter and another Pennsylvania youth have made it to the national level and they both had a blast.

The tellers usually get a chance to tell more than once and don't know who the judges are. As competions go this one has a very informal feel. The point is that they get to tell and have a great experience.

Speaking of DVDs, go to http://tinyurl.com/2rcbsf to watch a video about NYSS.

Thanks