We’ve been working on Little Miss Neat for the last couple of weeks. One of the activities I am trying to encourage A5 to do is narration. One big regret with my older ones is that I did not do it nearly enough with them. Narration is such an excellent prewriting skill and encourages clarity of thought as well as expression of those thoughts. To this end I have been trying to fit in narration each day with A5. I have become increasingly encouraged by the effectiveness of something as simple as retelling a story. This narration I thought was really very good, and as I always throw their work away I wanted to record it here. It is a narration about the book pictured below book, which I have read to her daily for the last week. I had two copies (bought for pennies at a charity shop):
I cut one up and she spread out the pictures in order and retold Miss Neat’s story using the pictures as prompts:
I have written it exactly as she said it:
Little Miss Neat is the neatest person in the world. She cleans her house, called Two Pin Cottage because it is as clean as two pins, all the time.
One morning she woke up and saw a puddle in the middle of her garden.
‘Oh, gosh,’ she said. She dashed out and cleaned up every drop of puddle in her garden.
She spent a whole week packing, polishing and dusting her suit case.
She went on holiday saying, ‘I hope it doesn’t get too dusty while I am out.’
Mr Muddle wanted to go to Little Miss Neat’s house, but instead of posting the letter, in a muddle he posted the cheese sandwich instead. A posted cheese sandwich! What a muddle!
Mr Muddle came to Little Miss Neat’s house. He knocked on the door and said, ‘Goodbye!’ It should have been hello!
Little Miss Neat wasn’t there.
‘Home nobody?’ he said in a muddle. He made himself a cup of tea and went home.
Little Miss Neat came home and decided to make herself a cup of tea. It wasn’t as easy as she had thought because she couldn’t find anything.
Mr Muddle phoned her, ‘Goodbye,’ he said.
‘Hello?’ Little Miss Neat said. ‘Is that Mr Muddle? Did you come round for tea whilst I was on holiday?’
‘Yes,’ he said, getting it right for once.
Little Miss Neat sat down on the armchair next to the telephone and sighed.
Then she felt something dig into her.
‘Ouch!’ She looked under the cushion and there were all her knives and forks and teaspoons.
THE END
Well done A5!
Hi Claire. I can just picture that wee smiley face! Great story telling. Give them all a hug from us today and tell them we love them. xxxxxxx
I read out your comment to A and her face looked completely incredulous as she asked ‘ you mean Granny and Grandad from Ireland wrote that??!’
Lovely-this reminds me that I ought to ask my five year old to do more narration.
It’s funny what you learn from the older children, but this is definitely one thing I intend to do more of.
I feel like I’ve just read the book 🙂 It’s a great idea to save work on this blog rather than have loads and loads of papers sitting about.
Thanks Marie, that’s a sweet thing to say- I told A5 and she was chuffed!
She really did a great job with that – so much detail! I love the idea of cutting up the second copy and putting the pages in story order, too.
It works really well as an encouragement for her. I think probably she wouldn’t bother otherwise!
Well done A. Good Job!
Thanks Emma!
Great job! I always wanted to have a book I had 2 copies of to do something like that.
Mr Men books are so cheap to buy second hand over here, and the extra copies come in handy for so many things.
Well done to A5! That’s a very good narration. 🙂 I like how you’ve used the second book as a visual guide for her to sequence the story.
A sometimes struggles with her concentration so it really helps to focus her.
I love A5’s enthusiasm for schoolwork. (Admittedly, extremely fun schoolwork!) Wonderful narration.
Thanks Lucinda. I find it exhausting trying to keep up with her and find activities which will hold her attention. I need a nap just thinking about how many times a day she asks to do more school.
Great Narration. Well done A5!
Thanks Debbie!
Fantastic narration, A! I think narration is such an important skill to learn at an early age. As we are doing written narrations in history, I can see the benefit of learning early.
Claire, you are doing such a fantastic job of educating your children. They are going to be prepared for whatever path they choose in the future.
(I am working my way backwards in your posts. We have been busy here with school and also spring cleaning. Plus, the time change has thrown me off this time. I usually do so well with the change in the spring, but not this year.)
I know what you mean by busy. I feel that way too, although I’m not really sure why. I’m struggling to keep up with everything that needs to be done. Have a lovely time spring cleaning!
Bless her her worrying. She did a wonderful job!
She really does look worried doesn’t she? Thank you for your kind words, I shall tell her!