The scarcity of research on the use of storytelling in the foreign-language classroom with young children may be partly explained by the complexity of the problem itself. If we look at the problem as a whole, the first dimension that comes into the picture is communication. Storytelling as communication Garvie sees communication succeeding if both the child and the storyteller are good language users. In her terms, a good language user possesses an awareness of linguistic, psycholinguistic, discoursal, communicative, sociolinguistic, strategic, cognitive, and semantic features of the language. Since the young learner is unlikely to be a good language user, teachers should provide a classroom environment that will stimulate thought and feeling while cultivating listening and speaking skills.
Stories contribute to establishing that kind of environment.
We might theorize that storytelling is experience. This is both life experience and linguistic experience. The story mirrors the surrounding world and constructs a reality of its own, meeting the cognitive, psychological and emotional needs of the child. The Russian psychologist Zaporozhets pointed out that storytelling gives a child a play-like experience. The experience that storytelling offers is not only personal experience, it is a universal experience encompassing world cultures.