Create a sensory storytelling basket for preschoolers to go with the favourite picture book, Pinkalicious, to enjoy retelling the story in a fun and hands on way!
We have been enjoying making our series of sensory storytelling baskets to accompany some of our favourite picture books with sensory rich materials. Story telling and re-telling are extremely important stepping stones in the foundations of literacy development, and it’s important to find ways to do this in creative and age appropriate ways so that it is always inviting and fun, never a chore or forced.
For this latest storytelling basket, the girls picked out one of their favourite stories, Pinkalicious, and we talked about what props we might need in order to retell the story together.
We found a small bowl and spoon and made a cupcake by wrapping a plastic cup in wrapping paper and stuffing in a sponge, covered with a piece of felt. Onto this we stuck a pom pom for the cherry and drew the decoration with a Sharpie marker. We also cut some leaves from felt to represent the green foods, as well as finding a few green veggies from the play kitchen to re-enact those pages with.
We popped in a super-simple star wand to match the one Pinkalicious carries, made from a piece of gold card glued to a stick with some curled ribbon stuck to the top.
Then we simply told the story together, with them finding the objects we needed on each page and taking turns to hold them up. Then they re-told the story themselves, both with and without the props, using the main elements of the story and remembering the order that events happened in.
We leave out the basket for a while on our shelves for independent access and free play. When they are interested in another story we add that to the collection and eventually rotate this one to make room for another.
These are SO simple to set up and create really engaging play and learning opportunities. Which would be your child’s favourites to create?
What they are learning as they play:
literacy: re-telling a familiar story using story props and from memory, re-telling a familiar story in the correct sequence, identifying main characters and events in stories, turning pages from left to right, understanding that print has meaning
pshe: independent learning, identifying personal choices and favourites
See our PLAYFUL LITERACY archives for plenty of fun-filled story-telling, alphabet, reading and writing activities to try together.
See more of our Pinkalicious themed play ideas here!
And follow our LITERACY PLAY Pinterest boards for loads more ideas too!
Follow Anna @ The Imagination Tree’s board Literacy Play Ideas on Pinterest.
