Kevin MacKenzie

Readings

Storytelling Presentations (Ages 3 – 18)
Kevin tells a wide variety of stories to a wider variety of ages. Group sizes vary, and the program can be tailored to fit the needs of the audience.

For Schools/Libraries/Festivals
Story Stage: 1 – 80 students
Main Stage: 81 – 250 students
Festival Stage: 251+ students

Stories Told:
Traditional Stories – Fairy Tales, Folk Tales, Ghost Stories, Myths and Legends of the World, Student-Powered Improv Stories, Original Stories, Fingerplays, Multilingual Tongue-Twisters and Family Tales.

Study Guides:
Pre and post presentation storytelling, writing, and art activities for students are available in an electronic study guide.

Betchacan’t! Student Powered Stories
Stories created as a challenge from the students to Kevin. Kevin is forced to create plausible, entertaining tales from five unrelated ideas generated by the children. Fast paced storytelling that thrills the children to see an artist creating without a net, waiting for him to fail and wanting him to succeed. Students as old as grade five have asked afterwards “Did you really just make that up?” Post session activities include writing exercises in which students get to edit Kevin’s creations. [Ages 8 – 14]

Betchacan’t – Visual!
Improvised stories for younger children, based on drawings by the children. A hilarious play adventure which the children can quickly imitate and extend. [Ages 3 – 8, small group]

Incredible Zesty Righthisveryminute Stew
A recipe of folk, fairy, and ghost tales, personal, family, original and improvised stories, fingerplays, urban legends, jokes, tongue twisters, and riddles, stewed in audience participation. Stories are selected on the spot according to the age, stage, interests and the reactions of the students. Storytelling is a dance between the subtle feedback of the audience and the teller, and this presentation leaves the most room for boogie-in’! The students, through their reaction and interaction determine the direction of the presentation. [Available for all ages.]

Folks’ World, Folks’ Tales
The folktales in this presentation just hopped off the boat from everywhere. For younger students, African trickster Anansi the Spider might share the stage with Jackal from India, or Rabbit from Korea. For older students, romances from frivolous to fatal are featured. These presentations include wisdom and trickster tales, myths, legends, folk and fairy tales. [Available for all ages]

Special Equipment:

Amplification if group is over 80 students and as cosy a space as possible for any group size.

Book Sales:

Copies of books can be brought to be sold and autographed.

Workshops

Kevin’s workshops are always age appropriate, hands on, social, and fun. Activities are tailored to group size and the environment (space, lighting etc). Some of the workshops require an open space with matting or carpeting. Movement is a big part of most workshops.

Preferred age range in a workshop or performance is no more than three years, so that the material and delivery can be developmentally appropriate.

Introduction to Storytelling: Hilarious telling escapade involving the three R’s: retelling, re-enactment, and reflection. [Ages 3 – 4, 5 – 7, 8-10, 11 – 14, 15+]

Improv to Improve Writing: Improvised oral storytelling to facilitate creative writing. [Ages 8 – 9, 10 – 12, 13 – 15, 16+]

Presentation Skills: Improve public speaking skills by validating and igniting students’ strengths. [Ages 8 – 9, 10 – 12, 13 – 15, 16+]

Older Than the Hills: Wade into to the history of world folklore. [Ages 8 – 9, 10 – 12, 13 – 15, 16+]

Yuk Yuk Yuk: An in class festival of jokes, riddles, puns and oral humour [Ages 6 – 8, 9 – 10]

Boo? Boo! And Booboos: Creating and telling ghost stories. [Ages 7 – 8, 9 – 10]

Dad’s Big Bad Spanking: How to find and preserve embarrassing stories about adults! (OK it’s really a family history workshop – but don’t tell the students.) [Ages 7 – 9, 10 – 12, 13 – 15, 16+]

Lights, Camera, Story: Story structure as a springboard into drama. [Ages 3 – 4, 5 – 7, 8-10, 11 – 14, 15+]

Reading Buddies – Story Buddies! Telling To Young Children: A concise introduction to telling children’s stories with younger students, modelling orality [Ages 10 – 12, 13 – 15, 16+]

Special Equipment:

A blackboard or whiteboard or flipchart.

Book Sales:

Copies of books can be brought to be sold and autographed.

Biography

Kevin MacKenzie spent his school career looking out the window, wiggling, chatting, daydreaming, talking nonsense and distracting classmates. Somehow, even with this busy schedule, Kevin always made time for the poor lonely old principal, whom Kevin was sent to visit weekly and sometimes daily. Those visits were supposed to cheer the principal up; they never seemed to work.

Back then, they did not know what ADHD was or that Kevin had it, and assumed Kevin was just a little turkey. After setting the school system free, Kevin travelled the world for six years and planted nearly a hundred thousand trees before meeting his future wife and becoming a preschool teacher. Kevin learned a lot from the young children he worked with. They taught him that he had a gift for telling stories. So Kevin blossomed into a storyteller.

Eight years later, Kevin has told stories and given workshops to thousands of people around the world. He tells tales to toddlers, teens, thumb-twiddlers and all of their friends and relatives. Kevin has stood trembling before large audiences in Cuba, Mexico and Ecuador, sharing his favourite stories in Spanish. Thankfully, everyone laughed. Some of them even understood what he meant to say!

Here in Canada, the first thing Kevin does each morning is exercise. Then he reads. Every day. Kevin is deadly serious about keeping his body and mind in good shape. His teachers would be so happy!

As a full time freelance professional storyteller, Kevin spends most of his time looking out the window, wiggling, chatting, daydreaming, talking nonsense and distracting students and teachers. Only now, schools send him plane tickets and pay him money to do it. And when he visits principals, it usually does cheer them up.

OTHER PRESENTATIONS:
Tell It! Basic Introduction to Storytelling
ADHD - Strengthening Your Classroom’s Tale
Storytelling Toward Literacy
Fostering Creative Writing Through Improvised Storytelling
Multicultural Learning through World Folklore
Creating Confident Public Speakers
The Value of Scary Stories
Jokes, Riddles, Humour and Critical Silliness in the Classroom
Fingerplays, Rhythm, Movement and Joy – Young Children and Kinesthetic Learning
Telling Stories to Young Children
Dramatic Storytelling in Groups
ACME Story-epoxy – the Quick and Easy Glue to Bond Your Class Together