This week’s class explored Story Vines. It was the first time I had heard of them, and I really like the idea. I enjoy providing students with another form of expressing their ideas beyond pen and paper.

Story Vines are a fun and creative way for students to practice retelling a story. In ‘Sometimes Reading is Hard,’ Marlene McKay attributes the origins of Story Vines to an ancient African storytelling tradition, highlighting their potential for enhancing language skills and fostering literacy across the curriculum.

Story Vines help students ‘develop an understanding of story and sequence, introduce new vocabulary, link visual imagery with reading, and develop fluency in reading and speaking’ (Bright pg. 90)

To learn how to create a Story Vine I tried one out for myself! There are 8 steps to creating a Story Vine.

  1. Choose a book that you have read often and love.
  2. The second step is to create your own (teacher’s) Story Vine. To do this you will need long pieces of wool that is breaded. Using small toys and crafting supplies, retell the story along the wool.
  3. Next, read the story to the students.
  4. Then, retell the story following the your Story Vine.
  5. Now, have the students go out and recreate their own Story Vines using books they chose themselves.

Bright, R. ‘Sometimes Reading Is Hard. Using decoding, vocabulary, and comprehension strategies to inspire fluent, passionate, lifelong readers’. Pembroke Publishers Limited. 2021.

I took the time to create a Story Vine for the book ‘The Paper Bag Princess’ by Robert Munsch, illustrated by Michael Martchenko. Having known this book my whole life, I was very familiar with the storyline.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paper_Bag_Princess

When I was an Education Assistant, I participated in book character dress up day. I chose to dress up as Elizabeth from The Paper Bag Princess as my character for the day.

When working with primary students, it is important that they learn about elements of a story, including setting, characters, events, story structure (beginning, middle, and end), theme, and conflict. Through a Story Vine, students can express all of these elements in a fun and creative way.

I hope you enjoy the Story Vine I created 🙂

The first part of my Vine tells the story of Elizabeth and Princess Ronald and the love they had for each other.

*Please notice the love rope that runs down the Vine.

A fierce dragon appears and burns down the castle destroying everything inside and capturing Ronald. Elizabeth must wear a paper bag and go rescue her love from the dragon.

In her quest to rescue her love, Elizabeth seeks out the dragon and cleverly challenges it to various tasks, anticipating that the dragon would eventually grow tired and need to rest. After tasks such as burning down forests and traveling around the world, the dragon indeed becomes fatigued and takes a much-needed rest.

After saving Ronald, she realizes that she is better than him and can live a better life without him.

*Notice that the love rope ends when Elizabeth saves Ronald.

She dances away happily as an independent woman!