Ammarah Shah is a girl out on a mission. She is the founder of Kaho Kahani, a company that is looking to create educational and wholesome content in Urdu for kids.
She is like a one person production and is also and singer, performer and overall creative and academically talented person. And what really helps her stand out is her bubbly and charismatic disposition.
The Interview
Thank you for being with us today, how are you?
I am very well Maheen, Thank you.
Why did you choose such a unique and unpredictable career path?
I studied and observed how the current education system is failing in keeping children interested in academics and naturally I was concerned. So upon my research I tried and tested alternative education methods, and I found storytelling effective out of everything, so much that I ended up being a storyteller.
What do you do under your company Kaho Khani?
From writing to production, we make music,stories,books and other educational content for young children and design entertainment hours that have storytelling, music ,puppet shows and crafting class that revolves around a theme based on a story.
Why are stories important, and that to for children?
Children have a specific system of communication; you cant be bossy with them. To communicate with them we must know ways that don’t trigger their learning anxiety and for that, according to my so far learning, storytelling is the safer medium. Anything you want them to learn,directly pour the message in their subconscious through an entertaining story.
Speaking from an experience, its tricky and requires a lot of practice to be a good enough storyteller that kids go where you are trying to take them. It’s effective.
You have degrees in both Literature and Language Teaching, how do you incorporate what you’ve learned into your work?
In my MPhil thesis I explored effects of storytelling on vocabulary building of young children and after writing the whole thing I realized that studying literature alone is never sufficient if you want to be a foreign language teacher. We were taught an amazing course a masters level called “second language acquisition” in which we explored 50+ methods of teachings language that have been proposed,tested,retested and rejected. And there I understood that there is not one universal method of teaching a language; its specific for specific settings.
There are many things that I learned and applied but I’ll tell you only two due to time constraint because those two were game changers. First one was to sit where children are sitting so you connect them eye to eye heart to heart this marvelously deleted the learning anxiety in kids and the session learning was impeccable. Second was know your strength and don’t overcrowd the session, not one single child should feel ignored.
My MPhil thesis was an immense learning experience and I must say it was the only experience of my entire academic journey that I enjoyed by heart because I was emotionally involved. I have learned so much but to apply and experience it, I have a long way to go.
What are the difficulties that you face in this?
Maheen, I belong to an industry that sadly doesn’t exist in Pakistan. You see, there are no mentors who guide you particularly about writing an Urdu Story for the children of current era. Musharraf Ali Farooqi the writer of Between Clay and Dust is the only person taking storytelling to next level through his venture Storykit I adore him and feel we need more people who make ways for growing writers, singers,performers and puppeteers in the profession of storytelling.
What motivates you?
My audience which is the most beautiful bunch of people in the entire world Maheen!
Those little kids are pure of intention and attentive, the way they are wide awake and are all ears in the sessions overloads me with motivation that right after I see the event photos I end up writing for another one. Enthusiasm is contagious the energy you see in my sessions is all that I derive from them.
How has your experience been so far, any fun moments you would to share with us?
Its amusing, each day is a new day, each day I feel like growing. My inner child feels delighted. My work gives me the opportunity to see humans in their natural form and I feel what a blessed creation are we made.
What would you like to do in the future?
In Pakistan, there is an interesting phenomenon when it comes to English Literature degrees. I came to know about this painfully depressing pattern of how people waste their learning when I found out that 70% of our literature class batch are studying “Angrezi” so they are able to pass CSS exam,20% wanted to be English teacher and 10% were aiming for Mphil only (not to mention that 45% of the class was female and most of them got married and were not able to continue studies or profession).
I would like to create awareness for universities/collages that have literature department that they offer specifically designed programs for literature students that teaches them art of storytelling and story writing.
I am planning to train teachers as a storyteller,this would bring an immense rise of energy in learning environment. I would like to train literature students in a way that they learn how to exactly write a story for a kid who is not European by heart but has an indigenous sense of story in itself. Lack of children content writers makes me feel sad and I really want to fill this gap.
Thank you for delighting us with your energy, what would you like to say to our viewers?
Dr Shaban my prestigious professor, in his last lecture of social linguistics said and I quote, “Ragrra to lagy ga,there is no short cut to success”.
God bless my teachers.
Maheen Ahmed – Writing to create culture
@lahore_la_notte_
