Fairy Tale Elements - the right ingredients to brew a story! 3/10/16

I was so excited to get into the classroom this week! I wore a "Storytelling cloak" and encouraged the teachers to do the same! I brought in a bag with all of the fairy tale "ingredients" (colored scarves in various jars) and the teachers had made a little fire for the cauldron to sit on!

 I asked the students about the kinds of stories they had been learning about : Myth, Legend, Tall Tale, Fable - and let them know we were moving on to Fairy tales - and that we had to but the right elements together to make a fairy tale work - I called up the students and had them "pour" in the ingredients one at a time - each colored scarf had a corresponding element of the fairy tale inside the cauldron on a small poster with the same color as the scarf - as we added each one, I stirred it in the cauldron and pulled out the poster - we then discussed the element - talked about examples, and then moved on to the next.

Getting Witchy with Fairy Tale Story Ingredients!!

 I believe the teachers really liked this as a way of introducing story elements, as opposed to using a chart on it's own. The students bought in - which is tricky as they are getting to the end of third grade...

We then used the same storytelling idea from last week of gathering around the "hearth" to tell the stories - This was so much fun, and very much solidified the idea of creating a special space for reading aloud that added that extra touch of theatricality that made reading the fairy tales aloud that much more special. Each teacher also wore a story telling cape - this was a thought I had about continuing the idea of simple costuming to make things more fun - not just for the student, but for the teacher. Mrs. Mayer brought in a lovely blanket that her great-grandmother had made for her, and that she used to snuggle in while hearing family stories. She told the students about the blanket - the kids loved it and really connected to the special "ness" of the blanket.

Each of the third grade teachers have done such an amazing job with each new thing we try - we each told a story around the fire - and I was so impressed with their outgoing, energetic and extremely effective story telling. Inflection, animation and a "storytellers voice" had the kids enthralled.

It was also AWESOME to see how easily they picked out the elements of the stories that we had read - they were going deeper than just the obvious and pointed out many elements that I had not thought to bring up!

I believe this was a very effective way to introduce elements of a story - we also thought about how the cauldron with the scarves could also be a really cool way to talk to kids about color theory as well!