The 5 Finger Retell Strategy – Teaching Slides

This beautifully designed set of 23 slides is the perfect resource to use during your introduction with your students on the 5 finger retell strategy. This is a simple, yet effective strategy to help early learners remember the characteristics of a retell. The following characteristics are included:

1. Setting – Where the story takes place. When the story takes place.
2. Characters – The person or people, animals, and things in a story.
3. Problem – What goes wrong in the story, which the character has to solve or fix?
4. Events – The order of the events or things that happen in the story (beginning, middle, and end)
5. Solution – How the character fixes or solves what went wrong in the story.

Five characteristics for five fingers!

Please note that you’ll notice either a small ‘click’ or ‘edit’ word in the top left-hand corner of each slide. This is there to advise how that slide is best used.

For example, if it has the word ‘click’ – this slide works best in presentation mode and only needs you to ‘click.’ If it has ‘edit’, press ‘escape’ and then use this slide in ‘edit’ mode so you can drag and drop the items for the interactive element.

Why the 5 Finger Retell is Perfect!

The 5 finger retell is a simple and memorable framework that helps students organise their thoughts about a story. It breaks down the story into manageable components for little learners. This strategy also promises active reading and comprehension; by summarising key elements, students are encouraged to think critically about the story’s structure and content. The 5 finger retell is also a fantastic tool for developing oral communication skills as students learn to articulate the story’s key points in a structured way.

Download and Retell Today!

These teaching slides are available to download in Google Slides.

This resource was created by Samantha Rose, a teacher in Florida and a Teach Starter collaborator.