How to teach story elements

Why this matters

A student can fill in character, setting, problem and solution on a story map and still think the setting is only where the story happens. The story map never asks what happens to the problem when the place changes, so the teacher has to wait for quiz day to find out.

The four story elements and how they connect

• The character is who the story is about. A trait such as brave or scared shapes what the character does.
• The setting is where and when the story happens.
• The problem is what goes wrong, or what the character has to get past.
• The solution is how the problem gets solved.

The elements depend on each other. A snowstorm problem needs a snowy setting, and a scared character solves a problem differently from a brave one. The Common Core asks students to describe a character's traits and explain how the character's actions contribute to the sequence of events (CCSS RL.3.3).

In the Flint activity, Sparky writes each student a short story about something they love, then gives them Story Cards with three new settings to try. On a story map, a student fills in each box once and never sees what happens when one changes. Here, a student who presses Hot Desert watches the Problem card go blank and has to tell Sparky the new problem. A student who says nothing changes gets a sentence from their own story quoted back, and a right answer gets a harder question about the character's trait.

Rosa moves Blizzard's story to the desert

Rosa loves sledding with her dog. She can name the character and the setting in a story, but she hasn't seen that the setting can cause the problem.

Every student in the class gets the same greeting and the same steps: a story, Story Cards with three new places to try, then a harder question about the main character. The story is each student's own. Sparky writes it around what the student loves, and its next message depends on what the student just said.

Sparky builds the story around Rosa's sleddingSparky sends Rosa back to a sentence in the storyA right answer gets a harder question

R

Rosa

Interest: Sledding with her dogStarting point: Names the character and settingGets stuck: Thinks the setting is only the background

Sparky

Hi, reader! Today you will change one part of a story and see what happens to the rest. First, tell me something you love to do, or an animal you love.

Rosa

i love sledding with my dog

Sparky

How fun, sledding with your dog! Here is your story. Blizzard was a brave dog who loved the snow. One winter day, Blizzard and a child went sledding on a mountain trail. A big snowstorm rolled in fast. Snow covered the trail, and the child could not see the way down. But Blizzard was brave and did not give up. Blizzard sniffed the ground, found the hidden path and led the child safely down the mountain.

Sparky

Now look at your Story Cards! Press one of the new setting buttons: Hot Desert, Busy City or Sunny Beach. What happens to the problem when the setting changes?

Rosa

i picked hot desert. nothing changes. they still cant find the way down

Sparky

Look at this sentence from the story: "A big snowstorm rolled in fast. Snow covered the trail." Could a snowstorm happen in a hot desert?

Rosa

no there is no snow in the desert. the problem is its super hot and they run out of water

Sparky

Yes! The hot desert makes a brand new problem: no water and too much heat. Here are Blizzard and the child in the desert.

Understanding check

In the story, Blizzard was brave. What if Blizzard was the opposite, scared of everything? How would the solution change?

Rosa

blizzard would be too scared to lead the way. so the child has to be the brave one and find the water

Sparky

You got it! A scared Blizzard would not lead, so the child has to step up instead. The setting shapes the problem, and the character shapes the solution.

Said nothing changes, went back to the snowstorm sentence, named a new problem, then changed the solution

Rosa is an example student, and Sparky's replies and story are shortened. Sparky drew the second picture with a water bottle in the child's hand, though Rosa's problem was running out of water.

What Flint did for Rosa

• Sparky wrote a story about a brave dog on a sledding trail after Rosa said she loves sledding with her dog, and drew the snowy scene.
• Sparky built Story Cards from that story, so Rosa could press Hot Desert and watch the Problem card go blank.
• When Rosa said nothing changes, Sparky quoted the snowstorm sentence and asked whether it could happen in a desert. It didn't give her the answer.
• Once Rosa named a new problem, Sparky drew Blizzard in the desert and asked how a scared Blizzard would change the solution.

A teacher can't do this by hand for 30 students at once. Sparky does it in every student's chat.

The activity page shows who kept the old problem in a new place

While students work, Needs attention lists each student who is stuck and the message that showed it. Once three or more students submit, activity analytics sums up what the class understood and what to practice next.

Set up the activity for free

Change the Setting, Change the Story is in Flint's public library, with the greeting and Sparky's guidelines already set up. Open it, duplicate it into a free Flint account, and assign it to a class. Every student gets a story about something they love, their own Story Cards and their own pictures, and the activity page fills in as they work.

For more reading and writing activities, see Flint for English language arts.