This Princess-themed Roll-A-Story will have your children engaged and having fun as they roll a die to determine the characters, setting, and problem in their fairytale stories. Great fairytales tell captivating stories with fully developed characters, settings, and plots. Get your elementary-aged children excited about writing with this writing activity.
Remind your kids that every fairytale has five basic but important parts. These five parts are the characters, the setting, the plot, the conflict, and the resolution. These essential elements keep the story running smoothly and allow the action to develop in a logical way that the reader can follow.
If your child doesn’t quite grasp the 5 basic story elements, have them break down a Disney movie into the five components using this printable worksheet.
How to Use the Princess Roll-a-Story Printable
For this writing activity, your child will take a die and roll it four different times. The first time, they will roll it to choose the princess. For example, if they get a two, their princess would be Cinderella.
Then they roll again, and the next number they get determines their sidekick. The third roll determines their setting and the fourth roll determines the problem the princess and sidekick will be solving.
Once they have rolled out all the elements, then they will create a short story using them. So if they got Cinderella, Tinker Bell, at school, and gets caught by an evil troll. Your child would figure out a way to put them all together to make a story with a good beginning, middle, and end.
Materials Needed
- A story notebook. My favorite kind for elementary children are the story/drawing combo ones. With that option they can also illustrate the story. This Princess themed one is great for lower primary kids and this notebook is better for 3rd grade and up.
- Pens, Pencils, Markers, crayons
- Dice
- The Princess Roll-a-Story Printable
Expand the Learning Tips
- Put on a Play. As children act out a character they generally add details, such as tone of voice and extended dialogue that they wouldn’t have otherwise included in a simple writing exercise.
- Read the Princess Stories. Most kids have seen a lot of Disney movies, not all kids have read the books. Did you know there are Disney Princess chapter books?
- Encourage Use of the 5 Senses. Encourage your creative storyteller to add details about smells, tastes, and how things feel.
- Praise Your Writer. Show excitement about their stories. Give specific compliments like I love the way your character is described.
- Tell a Story First. It might help your child to go through one variation of the writing activity first and just verbalize the story. This is especially good for younger elementary students, but just talking out a story and asking your child why questions helps them add details they might not have thought of.
- Turn their story into a book. Put the drawings and writings on pieces of construction paper. For each book, make a cover out of heavier paper or cardstock, and add special art, a title, and their name as author. Punch holes in the pages and cover, and bind the book together with yarn or ribbon. You can also use a computer and scan their drawings and have them type their story.
Just remember to keep this activity fun and engaging, not stressful or homework-like. This princess roll-a-story activity is meant to get their creative juices going.
Looking for more writing exercises? Check out my Disney Inspired Writing Prompts.