Listening to a longer story

Ages 3 to 5 Read and do together · about 15 minutes

Read together

Close your eyes and listen. I will tell a story.

Then you tell me what happened.

Do it

1. Choose a short story or a Bible story from Little Way, with a few characters.
2. Read or tell it slowly. Pause at the end of each part to ask, “What do you think happens next?”
3. After the story, ask your child to tell it back to you in their own words.
4. Ask who, where and what. Do not worry about getting every detail.

Talk about it

• Who was in the story?
• What was your favourite part?

For the grown-up

Listening and retelling builds attention, memory and vocabulary. Longer stories are a step up from picture books.

Mark as done

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Where this comes from

• American Academy of Pediatrics, “Literacy Promotion: An Essential Component of Primary Care Pediatric Practice”, Pediatrics 134 (2014): 404 to 409
• Grover J. Whitehurst et al., “Accelerating Language Development through Picture Book Reading”, Developmental Psychology 24 (1988): 552 to 559

Written with AI assistance and checked against the sources listed. Please read it before sharing it with a child.