The Crow and the Pitcher (A Narration Exercise)

One of my favorite things we do occasionally in Language is Narration. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Narration, it is the process of reading a story to a child and having them tell the story back to you in their own words. This can also be done with art, the child looks at a picture or work of art and tells the story of the picture. In both cases it encourages the child to listen/look for detail, to imagine the story in their own mind and in their own words (comprehension) and it helps them learn pre-writing skills and sentence structure. Not to mention, when you read back to them their exact words and they hear inappropriate grammar it helps them to correct themselves. Obviously if they don't catch the mistakes, I will point them out. It is so fun for the boys to see "their words" put into story form to read or to read to Daddy when he gets home.

Today we read, The Crow and the Pitcher by Aesop. Below is their Narration.


The crow and the pitcher (Micah)
One day the crow was getting really thirsty because he was flying hard and it was hot. Just then he saw a pitcher on the bottom of a cool patio. He went down and he tried to drink, but there was just a bitty bitty bit of water inside the pitcher. And so he tried to get it with his beak, but his beak was too short. And so he went out under a tree looking and thinking of what could help him. Just then he saw some pebbles, he said, “Oh, maybe I could drop them inside the pitcher and then the water would rise.” He dropped the pebbles in one by one. The water rised and he drank and he drank and he drank and he drank until he was full.

Moral: “Many hard things can be accomplished with stuff.”


The Crow and the Pitcher (Josiah)
Once upon a time there was a crow flying over cottages and he began to get thirstier and thirstier. At the edge of a little patio there was a little pitcher with a bit of water in it. The crow thought, “I will try to tip the jar over and drink what spills.” But the jar was too heavy. So the crow tried to stretch his neck as long as he could to get the water, but he still couldn't drink the water because his neck was too short. And then the crow sat under the shade of a tree so that he could think for a bit. In the cool shade of that tree he noticed by the patio a bunch of pebbles. And he said, “If I can put those pebbles in the pitcher the water will rise and I can drink.” And so he began, one by one, picking up the pebbles and putting them in, picking up the pebbles and putting them in. Sooner or later the water was high enough for the crow to drink.

Moral: Hard work makes joy.