I am always looking for good ideas or resources that will invite my students to tell me their stories. I went to a conference just about a month ago and the speaker shared a book with us called, “Sitting in My Box” by Dee Lillegard and Jon Agee…
I am mad at myself right at the moment because I can’t find the speaker’s name but here is a photo of her sharing this wonderful book with us. I will come back and add her name as soon as I can find where I put it…
As soon as the speaker shared her wonderful idea of how to invite children to tell their own stories after reading the book, I was super excited and hunted down a copy of my own…
The book is about a little boy who is enjoying a good book about animals while sitting in a box when the animals begin to come and invite themselves to sit in the box too…
Just as the speaker suggested, I brought a box along with me and inside I placed one of each type of animal that was in the book inside the box. As we read the book, I revealed each animal that was in the box for the children to see…
I then put all of the animals back into the box and told the children that they were welcome to read my new book and retell the story too – then I left the book along with the box out for the children to explore during our center time…
And we had plenty of takers stop by and explore the animals in the box – perhaps telling the story in their own way and sometimes adding new animals – but always using their imagination as they played with the animals and the box or took a picture walk through the book…
After reading our story, I added an idea of my own to the telling of this book and invited the children to help me tell our own “Story in a Box”. I brought in my own very large box and began the story telling process. “”Once upon a time, Mrs. Stewart was reading a book when along came ______ and said “Let me in, let me in!”” I filled in the blank with each child’s name and as I did, each child climbed into my box…
One by one, all the children squeezed into my box and then I made them scoot over so I could climb in too! I suppose I should have already been in the box, like the child in the story, but the kids liked it when I made a big production about having to make them all scoot over so I could squeeze my way in…
And then I lightly pinched each of the children (like the flea bite in the book) and as I did, each child quickly and joyfully jumped out of my box – just like the animals did in the story!
Oh yes, this is a story that we will have to retell again – I love it!
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