Fairy Tales Unit - Themed ELA Activities for Third and Fourth Grade Students

Themed activities engage third and fourth graders in reading, language, and writing about fairy tales from around the world. They analyze multicultural folktales, learn about nonfiction paragraph structure, identify similes and metaphors, write limericks and plays.

Open the preview to take a closer look at the ELA unit.

Introduction to Fairy Tales

• Kids read four stories from different cultures: “Cinderella, or the Glass Slipper” (France), “The Fisherman and the Genie” (Middle East), “Ye Shen” (China), and “The Talking Eggs” (Louisiana).
• They learn about fairy tale elements and locate them in their reading.
• Activities for summarizing, comparing and contrasting are also included.

Analyzing Informational Paragraph Structure

• Students learn the basic structure of an informational paragraph.
• They analyze paragraphs about authors of traditional European fairy tales to find the topic, detail, and concluding sentences.
• Instruction culminates by scaffolding to the structure of a five-paragraph article.

Learning About Similes

• A slideshow teaches kids about similes and provides fairy tale examples.
• An exit ticket asks them to analyze four dragon-themed sentences with similes and tell what they mean.
• Then students write their own dragon similes.

Learning About Metaphors

• A slideshow teaches kids about metaphors and provides fairy tale examples.
• Given eight situations, they generate frog-themed metaphors.
• Then they analyze more frog figurative language and tell what it means.

Writing Limericks

• Students explore several limericks by Edward Lear.
• Then they learn about the structure of this form of poetry.
• Finally, kids write their own limericks about fairy tale characters. Fifteen themed templates are included: “Beauty and the Beast,” “Cinderella,” “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” “Goldilocks and the Three Bears,” “The Goose Girl,” “Hansel and Gretel,” “Jack and the Beanstalk,” “The Little Mermaid,” “The Princess and the Pea,” “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Puss in Boots,” “Rapunzel,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Snow White,” and “The Three Little Pigs.”

Writing Plays

• Kids learn about structural elements of poetry and practice.
• Then they rewrite age-appropriate fairy tales in dramatic form. Five stories are included: “Jack and the Beanstalk,” “Chicken Little,” “Goldilocks and the Three Bears,” “The Three Little Pigs,” and “The Frog Prince.”

Free Lesson Plans

• Fifteen days of fairy tale-themed lesson plans provide a sample schedule.
• You can use them to drive instruction – or pick and choose to create your own unit of study.

Bonus Files

• Kids add similes to a Mad-Libs style “Snow White” twisted tale.
• As they read a special version of “The Frog Prince,” they identify similes and metaphors.

Enjoy teaching!

Brenda Kovich