What Are Story Vines?

A story vine is a visual storytelling aid that uses representations on a braided vine to depict a narrative or sequence of events. These representations can include objects, pictures, drawings, or any other visual portrayal that sparks the imagination. The main goal of a story vine is to help students:

  • Expand their vocabulary
  • Link visual imagery with reading
  • Develop fluency in reading and speaking
  • Enhance their understanding of the story and its sequence (Bright, 2021, p. 91)

How Do Story Vines Apply to the Curriculum?

English Language Arts, Grade 3
Big Idea: Language and story can be a source of creativity and joy.
Story vines are an excellent tool for exploring language and story in a unique, creative way. Students can produce an original work based on their learning from the story, making the learning process more engaging and meaningful.

Arts Education, Grade 3
Big Idea: Creative experiences involve an interplay between exploration, inquiry, and purposeful choice.
Story vines encourage students to engage in inquiry by analyzing the story. Through purposeful decision-making, such as selecting what to display and how to represent it, students are empowered to create their own story vines.

How To: Step-by-Step

  1. Choose a Book
    Select a book that you love, know well, and that can be used year after year.
  2. Create a Story Vine
    Use any material that can be easily braided for the vine. Ensure the braid is long and wide enough to fit the artifacts you plan to use. The artifacts represent different parts of the story and its plot. Students can create their own artifacts by drawing them or finding images from magazines or online. Tip: Use a hot glue gun to secure the artifacts and ensure they stay in place longer.
  3. Read the Story Aloud to Your Students
    Be dramatic and expressive while reading. Make sure your reading is fluent and engaging.
  4. Retell the Story Using Your Story Vine
    Retell the story by referring to the artifacts on the story vine. While doing so, connect the artifacts to specific phrases or vocabulary from the original story. The retelling may differ, but students should recognize key elements and make connections.
  5. Have Students Choose a Book for Their Story Vine
    Recommend that students select a book they are familiar with to support oral fluency. Encourage them to flag memorable or important pages to make the planning process more manageable.
  6. Create the Story Vine
    It may be helpful to guide students through a tutorial on how to braid if they are unfamiliar with the process. For artifact collection, you can send a letter home to caregivers or ask students to bring craft materials. Make sure to also provide materials and glue guns in class.
  7. Practice, Practice, Practice!
    Give students ample time to practice their story vines, allowing them to become comfortable and confident in their storytelling abilities. This can be done individually or in small groups.
  8. Share the Story Vines
    Have students present their story vines. Presentations can be done in front of the whole class, in small groups, or one-on-one with the teacher (Bright, 2021, pp. 91-92).

Adaptations of Story Vines:

After making a story vine myself, I realized that the process can be quite labor-intensive, and using materials like large adult scissors and hot glue guns may not be ideal for students under Grade 3. I suggest, if you want to do this with younger students, to make the entire project paper-based. For example, the vine itself could be a simple strip of paper. Students would then draw their characters using pencils, crayons, markers, etc., cut them out, and glue them onto the paper strip with a glue stick.

Alternatively, you could pre-create the characters and major events on a sheet, and then have the students simply decorate and glue them in the correct order.

My Story Vine!

I created my very own story vine based on The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch. I had a fantastic time making it, and I’m excited to try it with students during my practicum!

Photo from: The Paper Bag Princess (Story Corner S.) by Robert Munsch | Goodreads

To create my story vine, I started by using yellow and orange yarn. I measured the yarn approximately to the length of my arm span and cut 15 pieces. Looking back, I wish I had cut more pieces because the yarn vine wasn’t as thick as I had hoped, but I carried on with the process. I then created all my artifacts and glued them onto the vine using a hot glue gun. And voilà! My story vine was complete!

Supplies Used:

  • Yarn
  • Scissors
  • Wooden peg people
  • Gold paint
  • Colored felt
  • Sharpies
  • Pipe cleaners
  • A paper bag
  • Wooden cutouts
  • Felt heart stickers

Artifact #1 & #2 (Wooden girl and wooden boy): Princess Elizabeth is all dressed up and madly in love with Prince Ronald!

Artifact #3 (Felt dragon): The dragon breaks in the castle and steals Prince Ronald.

Artifact #4 (Felt castle): The dragon burns down the castle.

Artifact #5 (Pipe cleaner tree): The dragon burns down the forest.

Artifact #6 (Mini Paper Bag): Princess Elizabeth needs to find something to wear after her castle is burned down. The only thing left unharmed by the fire is a paper bag, so she decides to wear it as a dress.

Artifact #7 (Wooden Zzz Sign): After Princess Elizabeth tricks the dragon into burning down ten, then fifty forests, and making him fly around as fast as he can, the dragon falls asleep from exhaustion. This gives Princess Elizabeth the opportunity to sneak into the cave, which was originally guarded by the dragon, to find and rescue Prince Ronald.

Artifact #8 (Broken Sticker Heart): When Princess Elizabeth finds Prince Ronald, he is unimpressed with her appearance. He tells her that her hair is tangled, she smells of ashes, and he sends her away, asking her to return only when she looks like a “real” princess. This breaks Elizabeth’s heart.

Artifact #9 (Felt Smiley Face): Princess Elizabeth decides she’s done with Prince Ronald. She tells him he’s a “bum” and runs off into the sunset, happily ever after.

My story vine as a whole!

Resources:

Listening, Speaking, Viewing, and Representing Activities – English Language Arts Teaching Resource 

Bright, Robin. (2021). Sometimes Reading is Hard : Using decoding, vocabulary, and comprehension strategies to inspire fluent, passionate, lifelong readers. Pembroke Publishers.