A Classic...With a Twist

"I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house down."

The Three Little Pigs.  A complete classic.  I'm not sure I've ever come in contact with a kid who had not heard the story.  But, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs is one that most of my former fourth graders had not read.  Jon Scieszka, the author, puts an interesting twist on the classic.  He tells the Wolf's side of the story.  It's a pretty convincing story.  If I were in a court of law, I'd have to vote not guilty, but I'll let you have your own opinion.  Your opinion would be wrong, but I'd let you have it.  Have I ever mentioned I dislike being wrong?  Pretty apparent, huh?

You're probably wondering what in the world I doing reading such primary books to fourth graders.  Well, I used a TON of primary books to teach reading.  With these two books specifically, we worked on comparing and contrasting, points of view, main ideas vs. supporting details, schema, the list goes on and on.  Primary books are excellent teaching tools.  Good, quick reads that allow you to focus on the skills associated with reading.

Since my world is no longer inundated with catering to the needs of building literacy in readers, I have to change the way I use these books.  I now want to build literacy in my two little non-readers that make messes in my clean house.  That's a whole other story.  I'll stay on track.  I promise.

With my two little mess makers, I still tell the story of The Three Little Pigs, and read The True Story of the Three Little Pigs only I don't have a beautiful T-Chart and colorful markers to record literary discoveries.  Oh, how I miss those T-Charts.  I realize some people long for Coach purses and Louis Vuitton luggage, but I long for perfect packs of Post-Its, unwrinkled chart paper, and brilliant colored unscented permanent markers.  It's a sickness. A disease really.

Back to learning.  Instead of perfect packs of Post-Its, unwrinkled chart paper, and brilliant unscented permanent markers, I have picture cards.  After telling Little Man the story of The Three Little Pigs, I give him some hand drawn cards of different scenes from the book.  Like a picture of the straw house, the stick house, and the brick house.  He puts them in the order that the wolf blew them down.  Then I ask him what he thought about the wolf.  We do this on one day and then take a break.

The following day I pull out the sequence picture cards from the day before, and ask him to tell me the story he heard yesterday.  If he does it well, we begin to read The Trues Story of the Three Little Pigs.  If he doesn't remember, I retell the original story and then we begin the new story.

During reading, I make sure we stop for some good 'ol fashion Think Time.  Think Time.  It's important.  Do it.  It's a vital step in your child comprehending what they are hearing.

After reading, I pull the sequence cards back out, and he puts them in order again.  Then I say, "Wow!  These stories were just alike!"  The wolf blows down every house but the brick house.  Hopefully, at this point Little Man (age 4) will pipe in that they weren't the same, and we'd talk about it.  If not, I'd probably say something like this, "That wolf was one really bad guy!"  I know Little Man would argue with this one.  Especially with the newest book fresh on his mind.  Either way, he's got some metacognition going on.  And that my friend, is what we're aimin' for!