Vivian Gussin Paley's "storytelling curriculum" consists of two interdependent activities, dictation and dramatization. It has long been recognized for its impact on young children's psychosocial, language, and narrative development. As a result of the Bush administration's educational policies, holistic, play-based curricula like storytelling are rapidly being replaced in early childhood classrooms across America by curricula aimed at specific sub-skills of the reading and writing process. This article provides a structural analysis of what happens when children dictate and dramatize original stories in the pre-kindergarten and kindergarten classroom. It highlights the opportunities for literacy learning around specific literacy sub-skills that are available in this holistic, play-based activity as well as the teacher's role in the process. It also looks at the storytelling curriculum's relationship to the goals of a "balanced" approach to early literacy instruction, including oral language development, narrative form, and word study.