Bring traditional tales to life in your classroom with this engaging writing unit by published children’s author Dan Smith. Based on his lively retelling of The Little Red Hen, this unit helps pupils read, explore and rewrite a much-loved story while developing key English skills.
Every element follows a carefully mapped framework that supports progression in reading, writing and vocabulary development.
Plan with confidence
Each unit includes two to three weeks of detailed lesson planning designed to meet Year 1 English objectives. Teacher notes, annotated and non-annotated PowerPoint slides, activity sheets, sequencing cards and story maps make it easy to deliver lessons with confidence.
The unit also connects naturally with design technology through its cooking and nutrition theme, encouraging cross-curricular learning.
Explore a rich model text
Pupils will read and discuss The Little Red Hen, available as plain, illustrated and annotated PDFs, before sequencing and retelling the story together.
Through story maps and oral rehearsal, pupils will internalise narrative structure and traditional tale conventions. Class and group retellings build fluency, confidence and a love of storytelling.
Build key English skills
This unit supports the following Year 1 English objectives:
- Learn new graphemes for reading and spelling – /wh/
- Begin to punctuate sentences with question marks
- Use a capital letter for the personal pronoun ‘I’
Pupils will also revisit key writing foundations: saying aloud what they will write, punctuating sentences with capital letters and full stops, leaving spaces between words and sequencing sentences to form short narratives.
Teach vocabulary for understanding
Rich vocabulary teaching runs throughout this unit. Pupils will explore Tier 2 words (plant, sow, grow, yard, grind) and Tier 3 words (corn, flour, bake, delicious) linked to the story’s farming and cooking themes.
Common exception words – such as the, some, she, so, ask, once, asked, there, was and come – are introduced and practised through reading and writing tasks.
Engage through practical activities
Lessons begin with a sensory hook: pupils will examine and taste sweetcorn, then sequence how it grows using sorting cards. They'll reread the story to identify new vocabulary, use story maps to retell events and act out the tale in groups.
Later, pupils will compose and write sentences or captions about the characters, building towards their own version of The Little Red Hen.
Clear pupil outcomes
By the end of the unit, pupils will:
- Retell a traditional tale confidently through speech and writing
- Use basic punctuation accurately, including capital letters, full stops and question marks
- Apply new graphemes and common exception words in their writing
- Write a short narrative based on The Little Red Hen
With its clear structure, rich vocabulary, and creative activities, this Year 1 writing unit from our Real Writing collection helps pupils see themselves as real writers while developing the essential skills of early literacy.