Point of View (Retelling)

Students rewrite a familiar fairy tale or story from the perspective of a secondary character rather than the protagonist.

Procedure

1. Write the name of a familiar fairy tale (e.g. Cinderella) on the board. Brainstorm key words students associate with it (ugly sisters, ball, prince, glass shoe, midnight).
2. Tell or read the story aloud. On a second reading, stop to elicit details from students (What was she wearing? How did she feel?) — making the narrative partly their collective construction.
3. Introduce the concept of viewpoint. Ask who the narrator is most sympathetic to. Clarify the difference between the narrator being sympathetic to a character and the story being written from that character's viewpoint.
4. Seat students in groups of four. Each group rewrites the story from the viewpoint of a different secondary character (e.g. an ugly stepsister, the fairy godmother, the prince, the stepmother).
5. To get started, groups consider: How did you meet the protagonist? What was your relationship? Why did you react that way? What did you want? How do you feel about the outcome?
6. Set a time limit and monitor. Groups tell their stories to the class.

Tips

• Works with any well-known fairy tale: Little Red Riding Hood (wolf, grandmother, huntsman), Goldilocks (each bear), Rapunzel (witch, prince)
• Try a non-animate narrator for advanced groups: the story from the perspective of the glass slipper or the pumpkin
• A simpler alternative: describe just one scene from the chosen character's viewpoint rather than the whole story
• Groups can use speech-to-text tools instead of handwriting