Retelling Fiction and Nonfiction

Hello Everyone!
As teachers we should constantly be evolving.  I was reminded of that this week by my teammate.  We were working on our retelling using our story spoons. She mentioned that she included another part to the retelling...the author's purpose.  She, of course, is right.  We had briefly talked about that in the past few weeks, but I did not include that in my retelling charts, posters, or hands on visual tools. Retelling is an important part of detecting comprehension skills in our young readers, and the kids did a great job of including all the necessary parts of retelling a fiction piece, but I needed to revisit my unit to include author's message.  Before I share that, I want to show some quick pics of our work on retelling so far.

We reviewed all the different parts of a fiction story and I introduced the colored symbols we will use to remind us of all the parts. We had kind of a snow theme going on last week, so I used the symbols as buttons on our snowman. 

The kids made their own retelling reminder tools

They worked on writing out their retelling of a fun story, The Biggest Snowman Ever" by Kroll.

Then used their retelling reminders as they read books from their book baskets.
Next week I will have them add an orange button to remind us of telling about the author's message!!

Also next week we will practice retelling nonfiction pieces.  I've had a few e-mails asking if I had anything to share to help kids with that kind of retelling. I finally got busy and put something together!! I am so sorry it took me so long!
We will use the same type of hand to head reminder tool.  For fiction stories we used spoons.  For nonfiction, we will use forks to get to the point!! :)

If you have followed this blog over the last few years, you know I have posted about retelling many times.  I've introduced our retelling ropes with posters, students pages, etc.  I think I am going to like using spoons and forks better.  They are easier for the kids to make, manipulate, and manage. They are easily portable and store well in book baskets. And they are cheap!! 

Evolving, Revolving, and Involving!! My new mantra!!

If this is something you think you can use, or if you think I'm way off base, please don't hesitate to leave me a comment! I promise I read them all even though I don't always reply. 

If you think you want a printable unit on retelling fiction and nonfiction,

CLICK HERE!!! 

The unit (25 pages) includes all the mini posters and directions for the hand to head retelling tools, as well as student retelling pages, poems, and rubrics to "grade" your kids' retellings!! I know I can't wait to see how they do on nonfiction pieces!

Please let me know if you find any typos or other silly mistakes.  Sometimes my ideas are way ahead of my typing!!! 

Have a great week, everyone! Thanks for stopping by and taking a peek through our little window!!

Till next time, 

Joyfully!

Nancy