Tiddler Story Telling Prompts
I always refer to my two children as water babies as they absolutely love anything to do with water, and that includes swimming and all things related to the ocean and sea life. So we have a lot of books about fish on our bookshelf, but one of our favourites has to be Tiddler by Julia Donaldson.
It’s such a fun and creative story about a storytelling fish who likes to tell tall tales, so it’s the perfect book to base our fun storytelling prompt game on. It’s super easy to set up and great to get the creative juices flowing.
We have included links to the products and books used in this activity. If you buy from these links we may earn a small commission.
Love this Julia Donaldson book then check out how you can use Story Stones with 2 other books by the same author with our Ideas for Story Stones Inspired by Kids Books.
What you will need for the Tiddler Story Telling Prompt Game
- Tiddler book
- Toy fish
- Strips of paper and pencil
- Tray
How to play the Tiddler Story Telling Prompt Game
To start out I wrote out a few storytelling prompts on the pieces of paper (older children could help with this part). These were inspired by the book, but could also be created by the children as part of the activity.
Then we folded up the pieces of paper and hid them under the various fish on our tray. Next, we took turns to choose a fish and read out our storytelling prompt.
Ethan is just learning to read, so this was also a great way for him to work on sounding out unfamiliar words and put sentences together. He then came up with the most creative stories about what was happening to Tiddler and told them in fantastic ways. I was so impressed that he didn’t just copy stories from the book, he actually came up with his own tall tales. And if he started to get stuck I would ask him questions to keep the story going.
When it was my turn to tell stories I tried to model very detailed and elaborate tales for him to be able to hear and then imitate. He was listening so intently and really enjoying the game. We started out with just a few story prompts today, but we will definitely be playing this game again with more prompts and even more crazy stories!
Niki is a former early years teacher and current stay at home Mum to her two children; Ethan (4 1/2) and Ivy (2). Originally from Canada, Niki has lived in the UK for the past 13 years.
She writes about learning through play with games, activities, crafts and fun over on Play & Learn Every Day!
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Cerys Parker
Cerys is a marine biologist, environmental educator, teacher, mum, and home educator from the UK. She loves getting creative, whether it is with simple and easy crafts and ideas, activities to make learning fun, or delicious recipes that you and your kids can cook together you'll find them all shared here on Rainy Day Mum.