Curated OER
Story Stew
Learners identify the elements of a story. In this reading and writing lesson, pupils read the book, Tyrone the Horrible by Hans Wihelm and then identify the characters, setting, and plot of the story.This lesson includes adaptations and...
Curated OER
Story Elements
Need a graphic organizer to help young readers list the events in a story? This worksheet includes the story title, author, setting, and characters split into four sections. Make charting story elements easy with this resource.
Mariely Sanchez
Story Map
What just happened in that story? Kids can track the plot of any story using this worksheet. They fill in the title, author, and illustrator as well as the setting, characters, major plot points, and their own conclusion about the story.
Curated OER
Scrambled Stories II
Review story elements with your class. They will use examples from a story to develop critical-thinking questions. Then they use a graphic organizer to describe the setting, character, and plot of the story, focusing on how they...
Curated OER
Plot and Conflict in W.W. Jacob's "The Monkey's Paw"
Tenth graders analyze the use of literary elements in W.W. Jacob's "The Monkey's Paw." Literary analysis is accomplished by a review of the plot and order of events in the story. Learners work in pairs to match the events from the story...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Character in Place: Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path” for the Common Core
How do writers use the interaction between elements like characterization and setting to create meaning? Readers of "A Worn Path" create a series of comic book-style graphics of Eudora Welty's short story and reflect on how Welty uses...
ReadWriteThink
Comics in the Classroom as an Introduction to Narrative Structure
A picture is worth a thousand words, but a comic strip combines both images and words for the ultimate narrative effect. After reading The Three Little Pigs and deciphering the plot elements, elementary readers work through four...
Curated OER
My Favorite Story
Students discuss their favorite book. In this book discussion activity, students name the title and tell what makes the book special. Students also review the setting, plot, conflict, and resolution. Students make a book that tells all...
Curated OER
Express Yourself Lesson Seed 12: Story Event
Focus on plot and the impact-specific events in The Cay. Class members use their double-entry journals, created in a previous lesson in this series, to record their thinking about the guiding question as they read chapters 15 through 17....
Curated OER
Identifying Setting Using Evidence from the Text
Help young readers find the setting in the story. They will review what a setting is with a modeled example by the teacher. After reading The Cow Who Wouldn't Come Down by Paul Brett Johnson and completing a practice sheet, they will be...
Waunakee Community School District
Identifying Themes in Literature
If your language arts learners have a hard time determining the universal theme of a written work, use a straightforward instructional activity to help them find it. After reviewing a list of common themes, kids note the title,...
Curated OER
What is the Setting of a Story?
First graders explore the concepts of what setting is and how it's determined in a story. They play the KidWorks program to help facilitate the setting in a story. They use resources such as a picture dictionary or word wall to find and...
Curated OER
Using Plot Elements to Retell a Story
The stories in Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street form the basis for a instructional activity on plot elements. The class examines introduction, sequence, problem, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution and...
Curated OER
James and the Giant Peach Plot Analysis
It's all about the plot, main events, and story mapping with this lesson. As the class reads the novel James and the Giant Peach, they create an excitement graph that actually charts key events and moments of excitement. After creating...
Literacy Design Collaborative
Analyzing Language through Dialogue and Internal Monologue in "The Scarlet Ibis"
James Hurst's short story "The Scarlet Ibis" provides eighth graders with an opportunity to sharpen their literary analysis skills. After a close reading of the text, class members highlight and annotate parts of the dialogue and...
Curated OER
Identifying the Problem in a Story
Model how to identify and describe the problem in a story with Eve Bunting’s My Red Balloon. Then guide your learners through the process with Olivia and the Missing Toy. For independent practice, individuals draw a picture and write a...
Core Knowledge Foundation
Stories Tell It Again!™ Read-Aloud Anthology
An anthology created for kindergarteners explores classic stories that have been told for generations. Young scholars listen to 10 read-alouds, answer reading comprehension questions, and practice a skill related to the text. Stories...
Curated OER
Plot of a Short Story (SMART Board)
Help your pupils track the plot of a short story with this SMART Board activity. Using the short story "The Dinner Party" by Mona Gardner (though the lesson would work with any other short story), they define the exposition, rising...
Vanier College
Analyzing Short Stories/Novels
Good questions can help focus readers' attention on the elements writers use to add depth to their stories. The questions on this worksheet do just that and encourage readers to think critically about a story and author's purpose.
Charleston School District
Analyzing Scatter Plots
Scatter plots tell a story about the data — you just need to be able to read it! Building from the previous lesson in the series where learners created scatter plots, they now learn how to find associations in those scatter plots. They...
Pinecrest Preparatory Middle and High School
Short Story Planning Guide
A short story is only as strong as its characters, development, and conflicts. Encourage the young authors in your class to plan their stories based on the elements of narrative writing, all provided in brainstorming graphic organizers.
Curated OER
The Learning Network: Re-envisioning Classic Stories
Readers reflect on enjoyable stories they know, brainstorm criteria that make a story "good," analyze a New York Times article about innovative children's performances, re-envision classics on their own, and peer edit drafts. Use this as...
Curated OER
Noisy Nora, Studious Students: Story Elements
Alliterative adjective nicknames generate stories inspired by Rosemary Wells' book Noisy Nora (also a thematic complement to any class with children who make a ruckus to get attention). Class members explore basic story elements --...
Scholastic
A Reading Guide to A Wrinkle in Time
Accompany a reading of Madeleine L'Engle's classic tale, A Wrinkle in Time, with a detailed guide equipped with 15 informative and useful chapters. Scholars discover who the author is, why she wrote the book, and crucial story elements...