City Mouse Country Mouse

About this resource

A City Mouse and Country Mouse fable companion for PreK to 2nd grade: a short retelling in pictures, a story map, cut-and-glue story order, a city or country sort, a wants and needs sort, a Venn diagram on three levels, a retell on three levels and a mouse-face craft, in one print-and-go unit.

The story page retells the old fable in our own short words, one picture for each part: Country Mouse lives in a quiet field, visits the city, meets a big cat and goes home. The fable is very old and free for anyone to retell, and nothing here is copied from a book, so use it with any copy you read aloud.

Then the thinking pages. On the story map children draw and write the characters, setting, problem and solution. On the story-order page they cut 5 picture cards, glue 4 in order (First, Next, Then, Last) and leave out the one that does not belong. On the city or country sort they cut 10 pictures (barn, bus, cow, tall buildings, tractor, taxi, hay, traffic light, fence, fire truck) and glue each in its place. On the wants and needs sort they cut 8 pictures and glue each one as a need or a want. Every sort piece has one right answer, and the answers are on the class data page.

The Venn diagram comes on three levels (a circle, square or triangle shape by the name line): cut and glue 6 picture cards, write words from a word bank, or write your own ideas and finish "The mice are the same because" and "The mice are different because". The retell is on three levels too: draw and trace, finish four sentences with a word bank, or retell the whole story in your own words. A favorite-part page has a big drawing box.

The craft is a big round mouse face with two ears, whiskers and a wedge of cheese, cut into 9 equal squares in three columns and three rows. Color the black-and-white pieces (or use the ready-colored set), cut and glue each piece on its twin; every glue box is exactly the piece size. Every student page has one short instruction with a picture and a "My name" line.

What'S Inside

• Start Here: what is inside, how to use it, the three levels and a five-day plan
• Meet the mice, and a word bank with 6 words (mouse, city, country, cheese, house, cat) to trace and write
• The story in pictures (4 parts), a story map and story order (5 cards to cut)
• City or country sort (10 pieces) and wants and needs sort (8 pieces)
• Compare and contrast Venn diagram on 3 levels and a retell on 3 levels
• My favorite part, a how-to-make page, the mouse craft (9 pieces to color and cut, the same 9 ready-colored, a glue page)
• A class data page with every answer, a family letter and a credits page

23 sheets in all, 18 of them for students.

Cutting Built For Small Hands

Every cutting page has big squares lined up edge to edge: 2.1 inches for the mouse pieces, 1.5 inches for the story and sort cards and 1.8 inches for the wants and needs cards. 47 pieces to cut in all. You will need crayons, scissors and glue sticks. Card stock suits the craft pages.

Who This Is For

PreK to 2nd grade classrooms, self-contained special education classrooms, and paraprofessionals who want a fable companion with sorting, sequencing and writing at three levels.

What This Is, And What It Is Not

A printable PDF (print and cut). It is not Google Slides, Docs or PowerPoint, and it has no fillable fields. It does not include a copy of the fable. It makes no claim about any student's age or rate of progress.