Stories

We finished the school year reading challenge with individually chosen stories, again as independent work.

SDG 14

As part of our project activities, Class 2 pupils explored SDG 14: Life Below Water.

We began by watching a short video and discussing what we saw, especially how the sea animals felt when surrounded by things that do not belong in the ocean. 

To make learning fun, we sang songs and played games to revise and learn the names of underwater animals.

Next, we joined forces with our international partners to create a collaborative story about animals, pollution, and hope for a cleaner ocean. Each school chose a situation, added a drawing to illustrate it, expressed an animal’s feelings, or suggested a solution.

Voices from the Ocean

Click to read this book, made with Book Creator

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I invited my pupils to create a poster together. Each child drew a sea or ocean animal and labelled it, so the poster became a colourful collection of marine life.

Finally, we agreed on our own rules for protecting the ocean and added them to a digital poster. 

This way, the pupils not only learned about underwater animals but also shared their ideas for keeping the underwater clean and safe.

Life on Land

As part of our EduTales FCL eTwinning project activities, Classes 4 and 5 pupils joined forces to write a chain story with their friends from Türkiye. In their teams, they first discussed how to continue the story, then wrote their part and finally illustrated the pages using various props.

Twinkling Tale

As part of our Celebrate with Us! eTwinning project activities, Class 4 pupils created a unique chain story with their friends from Lithuania, Spain, Taiwan and the USA. 

First, the Tale Weavers from IV3 shared their ideas in the class and then on the forum. They discussed what to include in their part of the story. Then, they wrote their first draft, refined their writing, and finally added it to the book. Next, they shared their feelings in the poll. It was challenging, but they felt proud.

The representatives of IV2 used Gemini and Copilot AI to create illustrations for the Spanish team's part. They discussed what to include in their prompts to make sure the illustrations matched their ideas. Most illustrators felt inspired and imaginative while making the images. Others were curious and thoughtful to see if AI would understand what the images should show.

By the way, our friends from Lithuania illustrated our part.

📖 Read the Twinkling Tale on StoryJumper

Bridging Tale

As part of our Cultural Bridges Across Europe eTwinning project activities, Class 5 pupils wrote a chain story with their friends from Türkiye.

📘 Read Bridging Tale on StoryJumper

Inspiring Painting

 My Class 4 pupils have created story characters, male and female detectives, and a thief, in Dream Studio. My Class 3 pupils voted for the best ones in their opinion.

My Class 6 pupils first read the stories in the collaborative Inspiring Painting digital book, one pupil after another, then wrote their story in groups. They added some props, too.

Magical Stories

When I introduced my Class 3 pupils to the idea of creating a chain story in English, they simply loved it. They were all eager to share their creative ideas and type them into the joint collaborative e-book we started with our friends from Lithuania.

We even scheduled an online meeting because we wanted to read and listen to each others' stories and play an escape room game together, but some tech problems prevented us from joining our friends. However, we played the game and our friends promised to do the same.

As for the stories, I have to say that they're pretty amazing. We can't wait to hear what the others think!

Read this book made on StoryJumper

Magical Stories

A few months ago, different groups of my Class 4 and Class 6 pupils joined mixed international magical teams with teachers from different countries as their mentors. Their first task was to share their ideas about the topic and characters of collaborative chain stories. Then, one school started and illustrated their page, the next one added theirs, and so on. The pupils from each school had the opportunity to start, add and finish different stories which are published online.

Read this book made on StoryJumper

I have to say that this activity was a bit challenging for some of my pupils, but they managed and were happy with the result. 

My youngest pupils later illustrated the pages their older friends had added.

 

The Tale of Peter Rabbit

 I've recently organised a reading session with my Class 4 pupils. Two pupils read a well-known tale by Beatrix Potter to their friends and later we played a board game in teams. 

 It was a lot of fun, although a bit too loud because of all the cheering.

The Fox and the Stork

Nevena, I3

 Class 1 pupils and I have recently read the story from Greece about the fox and the stork. Later, we discussed the good and bad sides of these neighbours' behaviour and concluded that we should not think about ourselves, but the others, too.

The Mouse's Garden

Nevena, I3

 My Class 1 pupils have recently enjoyed listening to the story from England about kindness. 

Later, I asked them to remember the situations when they were kind to the others and somebody was kind to them, and how that made them feel.

Hello, I am...

A few years ago, my pupils enjoyed the book about Charlie from London and creating their own. That's why I've recently decided to share the whole series with my Class 4 pupils and encourage them to create their own stories using a new web tool.

Read this book made on StoryJumper

The Little Engine

Nevena, I3

 My Class 1 pupils enjoyed listening and later watching the story from America about the little engine helping the old one having problems transporting toys to the children. 

We also talked about the situations when they helped the others or somebody else helped them.

A Scary Experience

Think about a scary experience you had in the past. Write about it in 80-100 words.
Organise your writing into 3 paragraphs:
Paragraph 1: Where were you? Who were you with? What was the weather like? What happened first?
Paragraph 2: What happened next? Pay attention to the order the events happened!
Paragraph 3: What happened in the end? How did you feel?

When I was five I went to a friend's house. It was a dark December night.
My friend and I were playing hide and seek. When we finished, she turned off the lights and took a lamp. She turned on the lamp and every time she did that she made a creepy noise. I started screaming and crying.
After my parents heard me screaming they got in the room and turned the lights on. That's how my scary experience was over. 

Lara Avramov, VI2

I was always afraid of bad weather.
It was in the summer 6 years ago. My parents and I took my brother to a friend's birthday party, and when we were returning home, the wind started to blow hard. Thunder started and it was raining hard. My dad immediately hurried to get home. A tree branch fell on the car. I saw a woman running after a stroller. She failed to reach it and it rolled over. Due to the crowd, Dad couldn't stop the car.
After the storm, we picked up Vukan from the party.
I'm still worried about the baby in the stroller.

Ognjen Orašanin, VI2

It was a cold, spooky night. Last day of October, Halloween has finally come. I was with my family at my grandpa’s house in a small village near our town. He lives in a street with only two houses, his and his neighbour’s. My sister and our cousin went out in the street to take some photos. The street is very small and all of the street lights haven’t lit up for years.
Just like I said, I was taking photos of them and suddenly, I saw something moving in the darkness of a small road, a bit farther. I told them, but they didn’t even look there and told me that it’s grandpa’s neighbour. I kept telling them that something scary was slowly walking toward us. They were really scared when I told them what it looked like. It was really tall, I wasn’t even able too see its face because of the trees, with long arms that were reaching his knees and it was very slim, it looked exactly like a horror character Slenderman. You probably wonder why they got scared at that moment. It’s because grandpa’s neighbour is pretty short and chubby. They looked and it was still walking towards us, but even a bit faster. We ran as fast as we could to the house. We were terrified, but I was also a bit excited.
So, if someone tells you a creepy creature is coming towards you, believe them, it might be true. I am going to my grandpa tomorrow. Wait, isn’t Halloween tomorrow!?

Jovana Karić, VI2

A Very Hungry Caterpillar

 I've recently shared with my youngest students the animated film about the very hungry caterpillar and I can't describe how astonished they were by the amount of food one tiny creature could eat, and how amazed they were when they saw it turn into a beautiful butterfly.

As a follow-up, one group made different kinds of food mentioned in the story.

Another group made and named the food they like.

Another group decided to draw their favourite parts from the story.

Kalina, I1

Anđela, I1

Rooster's Off to See the World

Before we read the story about the rooster off to see the world by Eric Carle, I asked my 7-year-olds to guess and draw the animals he meets on his trip. Most of them drew their favourite animals, a dog, a cat, a rabbit, a wolf, a fox, even a tiger.

Later, we did a bit of Maths, and counted the legs and heads of the animals. It was a lot of fun.

David, I1

Nevena, I1

Nađa, I1

Story Time

The Blue Cross

The story takes place in London, Great Britain, in the 1910s.   

The main characters are the detective Valentin, Flambeau and the priest Brown.
Flambeau was the biggest criminal in those days. He was a very tall man.
Valentin was the chief of the Paris police, and he was chasing after Flambeau.
We liked them.
Valentin was our favorite character because he fought for justice.    
We really liked the story because it was very interesting.
The story is about Valentin, who is chasing after Flambeau, that is looking for a cross with blue stones.
Priest Brown left the trails for him to find and catch. Eventually, Valentin caught Flambeau.    
We liked the book very much because it had many interesting parts we needed to figure out. Our favorite part was when the priest revealed he switched the parcels and that Flambeau didn't have the cross. It was funny when Valentin was arguing with his colleagues.

The book is for everyone.

Ratka Sokola, Darko Tot, Aleksandra Ilijin and Aleksandra Bajić, VIII1

Too old to rock and roll   

The story takes place in Greg's house.   

The main characters are Greg, Valerie and Steve.
Greg is a young boy that plays in a band. Valerie was a 40-year-old woman, a friend of Steve.
Steve was the same age as Valerie, who lost his wife due to a car accident.
Our favorite character was Valerie because she was a nice woman who helped Greg's father feel alive again.   

The story is about a man called Steve who lost his wife in an accident, and his child Greg who tries to make him feel alive again along with his friend Valerie.
The book was short but interesting and the ending was both a happy and a sad one.

We liked the book and our favorite part was when Greg went on his band practice, and as he got back home he saw his dad and Valerie having a nice time speaking together in a romantic scene.
If we could make anything, we would make Steve be more than friends with Valerie, since she is like a mother to Greg.

Đura Šibul, Anđela Beloš, Vanja Pažin and Nađa Blažić, VIII2

As the Inspector Said

The story takes place at Robert's house and in the middle of the night.   

The main characters are Robert, his wife Sonia and her lover Charles.

Robert is nearly twice as old as Sonia. He is an old boring man who cares only about his books and silver.

Sonia and Charles are bad people because they want to kill Robert and to take his silver. I didn't really like them. They made me feel maybe it will sound stupid, but like a good person because I would never do what Sonia and Charles did.

The story is about Robert's wife Sonia and her lover Charles who want to steal Robert's silver that he bought.

It happened that someone broke into Robert's house while he was sleeping and his wife Sonia woke him up and told him that she heard strange voices and that the burglar was in the house. Then he took his gun and went downstairs. Sonia heard gun shots and thought Robert was dead, but he wasn't. He came into the room and when she said to him that she thought he was murdered and asked him what had happened, he said the burglar got away and that it was Charles that was murdered.

It was really fun to read, but I didn't like the ending because someone died.   

I liked the book and my favourite part was the beginning because I got to know the characters, what they are like and what they want to do.

I would change the ending because Charles died even if he was a bad person. There were maybe a little scary bits when the burglar broke into the house.

I learned that karma is a real thing. ha ha ha...

Everybody should read this book.

Anastasija Bugarski, VIII4

Plastic Waste

My Class 3 students and I talked about different environmental issues and tried to find possible solutions which was later turned into another story.

Read this book made on StoryJumper

What's the weather like?

My younger students are digital natives so it is no wonder that they enjoy most when we explore different apps. This time we tried HP Reveal and Metaverse in the lesson I created with the teachers from Greece, Italy and Croatia during the Learning Event on Digital Augmented Stories.

 

As usual, the lesson with different web tools turned out to be a success.

First, we talked about the weather and revised the vocabulary with flashcards and a mind map. Then, I asked my students what kind of weather they like, and it turned out that sunny and snowy are their favourites. Of course, I also asked them the reasons why they like or don't like certain kind of weather.

Later, I distributed the weather cards among the students and asked them to raise the appropriate one when they hear the word in the song which followed. It was fun.

After that, we read the story about the Wind and the Sun together, and whenever the Wind group heard their name, they had to make a sound or movement.

Read this book made on StoryJumper

The Sun group also made a sound and movement when they heard their name, so it was an interactive reading. It was followed by an online comprehension quiz.

Then, I told them that some pages in the book hide a surprise which can only be revealed by a special app.

After experimenting with this AR app, we moved on to different QR Codes which hide interesting videos and online games, so we played them one at a time.

Finally, we revised the weather words with online flashcards and sang the new song once again.