School kids entertained by storytellers at local festival

Oct. 21—Storyteller Bil Lepp pretended to be a school boy carefully carrying around an egg that symbolized a baby, and the unlikely scene sparked laughter from a crowd of Limestone County middle and high school students Thursday morning.

The school he attended growing up, Lepp explained, was too poor to have dolls for the girls to carry around to learn the effort required in child-raising, so it used eggs.

Lepp spoke during the 16th annual Athens Storytelling Festival, which continues through Saturday night at Athens State University. Students from Athens City and Limestone County schools were given exclusive school-day performances Tuesday through Thursday.

From West Virginia, Lepp, 52, started storytelling in 1990 and has been a professional storyteller since 2002. He said he grew up in a predominantly female school, so he did not have much in common with many fellow students. He said the girls actually did participate in the egg-as-baby exercise.

"I thought, I can write a story about that because everybody in high school at some point had to carry around something," Lepp said. "That way I knew if I was ever in that situation again at least I would have something that we would have in common."

Avery Jones, 16, an Ardmore High junior, said Lepp was her favorite storyteller.

"I like how he gets the audience involved," Jones said.

Another 16-year-old Ardmore junior, Lauren Moore, said her favorite storyteller was Bobby Norfolk.

"I liked the one of the Little Red Riding Hood where he rapped," she said. "He had all the students interacting with him. They were clapping and saying lines with him."

Norfolk, 71 from Missouri, has been a professional storyteller since 1981.

Norfolk said the kids would rap back and forth with him. "Red, red and when the shoes hit the ground, clop, clop; some of them were clapping. ... I grew up with The Temptations, Roberta Flack and B.B. King and they don't know who these people are, but they do know hip hop."

Moore and Jones said they have been to the festival's school days three or four times and hope to come back next year.

"It gives you a break from the stress of school," Moore said. "You can enjoy it and get something out of it."

Jones said she enjoys it because most of the stories are funny.

Leah Oakley has been on the festival's board for four or five years. She said over the course of the three school days this week, about 4,500 students attended.

Oakley said each school had a chance to choose a student storyteller that would speak at the school days and perhaps for the weekend. She said there were 13 in all, six from Athens City Schools and seven from Limestone County Schools.

"On Monday night we had a friends and family night just to give our students a chance to practice on stage in front of their families," Oakley said. "We had a couple of anonymous judges that chose two elementary students, a middle school student and a high school student."

Those four students told their stories again Thursday night in front of the public. Riley Clark, an 11-year-old sixth grader from Tanner High, was the student storyteller Thursday morning. He said he entered the contest "so kids could enjoy the stories."

Clark told the story of the boy who cried wolf from the wolf's perspective and said it took him about a week to come up with the story. He said he was nervous but felt more comfortable as the students reacted.

"Usually, I'm a quiet kid and my mom wanted me to do it so it would help me have more courage," he said.

Moore said Clark told a good story and that he was brave for getting up in front of all the students.

"I don't know how he could remember all that," Jones said. "He quoted a lot of it, and it was good."

—erica.smith@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2460.