There is a reason that certain books and stories become classics. The Three Little Pigs, is a story that has been told countless time, in countless ways. It is a story that children know and enjoy.
I love reading stories to my children at home, and my students at school. Even stories like, The Three Little Pigs, they are happy to listen to over and over again.
I am always looking for new, creative ways to tell these well known stories to children. I recently created a story play where I retell a story, but with small props and characters. The children were mesmerized and I had a new way of story telling!
Story plays are basically a creative form of storytelling that allow a story to be told in a hands-on way.
One of my favourite things about teaching is working with other teachers and learning from them. My teaching partners are a source of inspiration to me on a daily basis.
I have also had the rewarding experience of working with a student teacher who held so much enthusiasm and passion for teaching that I wanted to share one of my favourite activities that he created.
When preparing an activity/lesson for the kindergarten class, he created a story play based on the classic story, “The Three Little Pigs”.
Our students have been introduced to story plays before and always enjoy them.
Story plays use small props and characters to retell a story. If you are looking for a new way to tell a story, this form of story telling is magical for kids.
We all know that reading is an essential skill. Read more with this post about the Importance of Reading.
The Three Little Pigs Props
It can take some time to prepare the props for this story play. However, you can always simplify the props by either printing off pictures of the props that you need, i.e. a picture of a straw house. Some main items to create the props for The Three Little Pigs include:
- Construction Paper
- Pipe Cleaners
- Twigs/Sticks
- Paint
- 3 Little Pig Figures
- 1 Wolf Figure
- Hot Glue
With these materials, you can create beautiful props for the story play. The more materials you add to create with, the more details you can add, but if you are looking to keep it fairly simple, these materials will work well.
Or you can also get the children involved, by having them create the props. They will love being given the opportunity to do some arts and crafts and use their imagination to create.
The props that our student teacher created caught, and kept, children’s attention immediately. He put a lot of detail and thought into every prop he used.
Each of the pigs homes are made from different materials. The materials are simple, but area used in a way to show all parts of the story.
For example, to create the straw house, pipe cleaners were used.
Presenting The Three Little Pigs as a Story Play
For a story play, the story teller sits on a small mat or carpet with the audience looking at them. Typically a few props are set on the carpet before the story begins.
These few initial props give children a chance to see a few items from the story. It also is a great time to have children predict what they think the story is going to be about.
As the story is told, the story teller moves the characters and props to correspond to the story.
For example, as the story is told, and the wolf blows down the houses, the houses are turned over and ‘destroyed’.
Even for a popular story like “The 3 Little Pigs,” presenting the story in this way engages children in a way that you have to see to believe.
While our student teacher was presenting, it was interesting to be an observer and watch the children be completely focused and engaged on the story being told.
I like the variety of materials used to create the different props. The trees and apples are made from felt.
Although the props are detailed and beautifully created for this story play, another option for a story play within a classroom is for the children to be given a variety of materials and create their own props.
I love the details and thought that went into each prop for this retelling of “The Three Little Pigs”. It sparked an interest in story telling in this way with the children
Extension Ideas
An additional feature that was used during this story play was sound effects (i.e. the wolf’s voice, the wolf splashing into a pot of water.) The use of sound effects added a whole other element to the story play.
This addition of sound was something that I was really impressed by and something that I will be integrating into my story plays from now on.
To add sound effects, the voices and sounds were recorded on a cell phone and hidden speaker were used to project the sounds.
The props that our student teacher created for this retelling of “The Three Little Pigs”, were perfect and beautiful. You can create a story play for any story you want. You don’t need a prop for every single location and part of the book, just enough to tell the story.
The student teacher who created this story play is an excellent story teller to begin with; however, this interactive form of story telling raises the bar for all story telling.
One of the benefits of story plays is that afterwards, children always find ways to create their own story plays and retell stories using props and toys that they have on hand.
I am always open to new ideas and activities for kids. This story play gave me lots of ideas to add to my own teaching!
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The Three Little Pigs Activity Book
Since the children enjoyed the activity so much, I wanted to extend it in class and with my own kids at home. I created a flipbook full of activity for young children. Kids will love doing the fun, engaging activities including some math and language as well as a word search and crossword puzzle.
The flipbook is FREE to all Hands-On Teaching Ideas subscribers. Click the image below to subscribe and gain access to my FREE Resource Library and receive emails about my latest activities and products.
More Hands-On Teaching Ideas
If you enjoyed the story play ideas for “The Three Little Pigs”, then you may also enjoy some more hands-on learning activities for home, or school. Below is a collection of my favourite, and most popular blog posts.
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