ABOUT SHREYA

Shreya curates age-appropriate and theme-oriented stories for children and adults and then sharing those stories in schools, festivals, libraries, corporates, and other spaces across India. 

Shreya has an amazing ability to make an instant connection with children. She often uses visual art as an aid for storytelling, and her performances are a treat for the senses, as she brings her stories alive with songs, picture cards, glove puppets, and paintings. Shreya trains teachers to help integrate stories into education.

Her performances are a treat for the senses, as she brings her stories alive with songs, picture cards, glove puppets, and visual art.

Biswas has thus far taught storytelling techniques to 15000 plus students and 5,000 teachers. About 20,000 corporate employees across the country have also benefited from Biswas’s customized workshops.

A chemistry graduate of Calcutta University, Biswas started eclectic reading in her ancestral home and neighborhood libraries in Kolkata from a young age. Raised in a joint family, much of her childhood was spent listening to her grandparents narrate stories from the Mahabharata and Ramayana, and Bengali classical literature. In the mid-1990s after she moved to Bangalore, she signed up with a playschool and taught pre-schoolers by storytelling. In 2009, she attended a British Council event featuring well-known professional storyteller Richard Martin who drew from Irish and English folklore to narrate captivating stories to eager children and adults. “That’s when I became aware that storytelling was my preferred vocation,”

She later attended workshops conducted by British and American storytelling professionals. In 2012, Biswas began her career as an independent storyteller at the Sneha Nilaya, an orphanage, and the Spastics Society, Bangalore where she volunteered her services. “These experiences strengthened her belief in the power of educational storytelling. Driven by the need to share her experience with others, and to spread awareness of this pedagogy, Biswas promoted KATHARANGAM (‘stories space’) in 2013.

“Having grown up listening to stories, I decided to experiment with storytelling as a teaching technique to light the spark of creativity and within the teachers’ community to make learning an enjoyable experience for students. I believe my craft is in performing a story by using props, music, and sometimes even choreography. My goal is to bring smiles back into regimented classrooms and improve communication in corporate offices,” says Biswas.

We are bullish about the future. “Teaching basic English through storytelling to government school children is next on my agenda. I also intend to design awareness programs on cyber-security for adults and teachers, and identifying children’s learning disabilities for parents and teachers,” says Biswas.