Craft Stick Story Elements

Explicit Instruction/Teacher modeling

• On the craft sticks write one story element: retell, author's purpose, character traits, sequence, or main idea. Make 4-5 sets of the sticks.
• Author's purposeHelps the students understand why the author wrote the story: to entertain, give information, or persuade us.
• Character traitsAllow the students to understand and interpret characters' feelings.
• SequenceHelps us understand the order of what happened in the story.
• Main ideaExplains what the story is all about.
• Choose a stick from the bag and read it to the students.
• On the chart paper, write something about Leo the Late BloomerThat's related to the term on the stick.
• Let the students read what you have written.
• Choose another stick and let the students help you write something for it.
• Continue until all the sticks have been used.

Guided practise

• Place the students in groups. Let them select captains for their groups. Review the rules for collaborative group conversations by creating a poster titled "Group Work."
  1. Listen to others carefully
  2. Speak one at a time
  3. Talk about the text or topic
• Have students give a thumbs up if they can agree to follow these rules for group discussions.
• Give each group a resealable bag that contains story element sticks and a tape recorder (with a cassette tape already enclosed).
• Have the captains each choose a group member to pull a craft stick from the bag.
• The member should read it to the group. Have groups discuss how the element relates to Leo the Late Bloomer.
• When a group has a consensus, instead of writing the answer, they should record their answer on the cassette.
• Have students continue until all the story element sticks have been used.

Independent working time

• Let the students each choose a story element craft stick, read it, and return to their seats. Have them write in their journals the answer for the story element about the text.
• Tell them to think about the answer from their group time and write it down. Remind them to stay on topic with their answer.