Funny, secret, collaborative stories

Today I introduced Rachel to something I remember doing with friends school. One of us would started a story with a sentence. They'd then fold over the page and the other would write the next sentence. This would continue until the page was filled and then we'd read the story.

I thought that might be a bit open ended, so I wrote a 20 sentence story with blanks in each line, which would be filled by us each in turn, secretly. Here are the sentences.

Once upon a time there was a ......
And a .......
Who lived in a .......
Near a .......

One day they decided to go to .......
They took some .......
And some .......
And put them in a .......
They went by .........
It took them ...... To get there

When they arrived they ......
Then they ......
They had lots of .......
Then they were .......

When they got home they .......
And they .....
Then they ate .....
And they went to ......

They all lived ...... ever after.
The End


I was amazed how well this worked. Rachel started and then folded the paper over so I couldn't see it. I completed the next sentence and folded it over and so on and so on.

When Rachel opened it up she could barely stop laughing when she read it, here is her second reading of it.



Of course I may have made a rod for my own back because now she wants to do more and more; here's one she did with Mike.



If you're child loves stories then this is a must do. And I'm pretty sure it'd be great for kids who prefer not to read or write without a great incentive.