Hands-On Language Arts: Story Trains

Want a fast and easy way to teach the parts of a plot to elementary kids? These hands-on language arts story trains help children see how all the elements of a plot fit together to make a good story.

Hands-On Language Arts: Story Trains

Teaching children how to write stories can be tricky. While some kids automatically understand the elements of a plot, other kids need help with remembering the parts of a plot to make their stories more interesting. Monkey has always been a little resistant to writing long assignments, so I came up with the idea of the story trains printable to help her not only remember the five parts of a plot, but also so that she would not feel overwhelmed by having to write an entire story at once.

The plan worked great, and Monkey wrote an adorable story on her train that used all five parts of a plot and there were no tears involved.

The story train printable comes with five trains for each part of the plot and also a short explanation of the five elements of a plot invented by Gustav Freytag. The printable has everything you need to complete a lesson on plot creation.

Download the free story trains printable!

Story Trains Variation

One adaptation that would work really well for classroom use or group use is to give each child one car to write part of the story on. We did this when we completed our story writing unit in Girl Scouts. As a group, all the girls came up with the basic plot structure, characters, and setting for the story. Each girl then wrote one part of the story on her own. The story was hilarious and each piece showcased each girl’s personality. I definitely recommend doing this for a group of kids, especially if you have any reluctant writers in the group.