Teacher Edition

The Three WishesRetold by Sara OldfieldIllustrated by Alex Stitt

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Text highlights• Comic illustrations support and add humour

to the story

• Direct speech is used throughout

• A range of punctuation emphasises meaning

Vocabularyman, woman, happy, rich, wished, wish, fairy,

appeared, disappeared, beautiful, famous, sick,

miserable, healthy, poor, hungry, sausages,

nose, scarf, jewels, necklace

How to use this bookBefore reading: TalkthroughTalk through the book with the children. Encouragethem to predict the text from the cover and thepictures, and to think about the information theyprovide. Direct the children’s attention to aspects ofthe text that may challenge them. Support the childrento deal with these challenges by asking theTalkthrough questions on each page.

During reading: Observe and supportObserve the children as they read. Encourage them tomonitor their own reading as they comprehend thetext. As needed, support children by assisting them todiscover and use reading strategies and cues to solveproblems and respond to reading challenges that arisein the text. Interruptions to the child’s reading shouldbe minimal and focused on a specified learning need.

After reading: Comprehension, returning tothe text, responding and writing linksTo further develop children’s understanding of thetext, select from activities found on page 12 and theinside back cover. These whole text, sentence and wordlevel activities reinforce the teaching focus of thisbook. Assessment ideas are provided to assist withplanning for further teaching.

Horwitz EducationA Division of HorwitzPublications Pty Ltd55 Chandos StreetSt Leonards NSW 2065Australia

Horwitz Gardner EducationUnit 53, CressexEnterprise ParkLincoln RoadHigh Wycombe, Bucks, HP12 3RL,United Kingdom

Published edition © Eleanor Curtain Publishing 2003

First published 2003

Apart from any fair dealing forthe purposes of study, research,criticism or review, aspermitted under the CopyrightAct of Australia, no part of thisbook may be reproduced byany process, or transmitted inany form, without permissionof the copyright owner. Wherecopies of part or the whole ofthis book are made under PartVB of the Copyright Act, thelaw requires that records ofsuch copying be kept and thecopyright owner is entitled toclaim payment.

Developed by Eleanor Curtain PublishingText: Jenny FeelyConsultant: Susan HillDesigned by Alexander StittProduction by Publishing Solutions

Printed in Hong Kong

ISBN 0 7253 2845 2Pack ISBN 0 7253 2801 0(6 Student Books + 1 TeacherEdition)

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Setting the contextAsk: If you had three wishesand could wish for anything inthe world, what would youwish for?Discuss the children’s ideasand suggestions.

Introducing the bookThis book is called ‘TheThree Wishes’. It is about aman and a woman whowere given three wishes by afairy. They couldn’t agree onwhat to wish for and wastedtheir wishes by mistake.

Front coverWhat do you think has happened? Why doesthe woman have sausages growing from theend of her nose?What do you think these people are thinkingabout? What might they wish for?

Title pageIs Sara Oldfield the author? What do youthink the word ‘retold’ means? What does ittell you about the story? Why is there apicture of a fairy wand?

The Three WishesRetold by Sara OldfieldIllustrated by Alex Stitt

alphakids The Three Wishes

Retold by Sara Oldfield

Illustrated by Alex Stitt

alphakids

2

The Three Wishes Pages 2–3

TalkthroughOnce upon a time a man and woman were sitting at home.What were they doing? How do you know? Why does thestory begin with the words ‘Once upon a time…’?Point out the thinking cloud and discuss its use.What do the man and woman wish for?

Observe and supportCan the child explain the use of the thinking cloud in theillustrations?What is this called? What does it tell us about the story?

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3

Once upon a time a man and a woman were sitting at home.

They were happy but theywished they could be richlike the people next door.

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4

The Three Wishes Pages 4–5

TalkthroughThe woman says that she wants just one wish. Then whathappened? How many wishes do you think the fairy gave theman and woman? What do you think they will wish for?

Observe and supportDoes the child use contextual information to understandthe meaning of new vocabulary?What do the words ‘appeared’ and ‘disappeared’ mean?How are these words different? How did you work that out?

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5

‘It’s not fair!’ said the woman.‘If I could just have one wish,I know I could be really happy.’

Suddenly a fairy appeared.

‘I will grant you three wishes,’ she said. ‘But be carefulwhat you wish for.’

Then the fairy disappeared.

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6

The Three Wishes Pages 6–9

TalkthroughWhat does the woman wish for? What does the man wishfor? Do you think it is more important to be beautiful, richand famous, or healthy and happy?Why does the woman get some sausages, even though shewants to be beautiful, rich and famous? What does the manthink of that wish? What does he say?

Observe and supportDoes the child search for a range of cues as they read?If the child makes an error encourage them to re-readthe text.Try that again and think about what would make sense.

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7

76

‘I know what I will wish for,’ said the woman. ‘I will wish to bebeautiful and rich and famous.’

‘What’s the use of being beautiful,rich and famous if you are sick and miserable?’ said the man.

‘You should wish to be healthy and happy and to live toone hundred.’

98

‘What’s the use of living to one hundred if you are poor and hungry?’ said the woman.

‘In fact, I’m hungry now.I wish we had some sausages.’

Suddenly some sausages appearedand one wish was gone.

‘What have you done?You have wasted a wish onsausages,’ said the man angrily.‘I wish they were stuck on the endof your nose!’

8

The Three Wishes Pages 10–13

TalkthroughWhy does the woman suddenly grow sausages from the endof her nose? How many wishes have they had now?Look at pages 12–13.Why does the man think of ways that the woman could livea happy life with the sausages stuck to her nose? Whatdoes the illustration tell us about what she thinks of hissuggestion?

Observe and supportDoes the child read the text with expression?How would the woman read the words on page 13? Whatmight her voice sound like? Can you make your voice soundlike that when you read?

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10 11

Suddenly the sausages werehanging from the end of the woman’s nose.The second wish was gone.

‘Help me! Help me!’ she cried.

The man tried to pull the sausages off hernose, but they wouldn’t come off.

She tried to pull them offher nose but they wouldn’tcome off.

She got up andtripped over thesausages.

12 13

‘I know what to do,’ said the man.‘We’ll use the last wish to make usvery rich. Then we will buy a scarfwith lots of jewels on it to hidethe sausages.’

‘Have you gone mad?’ cried the woman.‘I don’t want to live withsausages stuck on the endof my nose.

Get rid of them now!’

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The Three Wishes Pages 14–16

TalkthroughRead the text on page 14.What is the last wish? Does her wish work?Now look at page 16.What does the man say? What do they do with thesausages?How might they be feeling?

Observe and supportDoes the child use an understanding of letter/soundrelationships to check words?Read the last sentence of the book and point to the word‘sausages’.How did you know that word said ‘sausages’? What did youlook at? What did you think about?

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‘Maybe you could wrap themaround your neck like a necklace,’said the man.

The woman screamed and criedand cried and screamed and said,‘I wish I had my nose back.’

The sausages fell to the ground.

There were no more wishes left.

They both looked atthe sausages.

16

‘I’m hungry,’ said the man.

‘Me too,’ said the woman.

So they cooked the sausages and ate them.

12

The Three Wishes

Being a meaning makerEncourage the children to supporttheir answers with evidence from thebook as they discuss these questions:What did the woman wish for?Why did the fairy say, ‘Be careful whatyou wish for.’?Why did the man and woman wastetheir wishes?What should they have wished for?Could three wishes solve someone’sproblems? What should they wish for?

Being a code breakerChildren may like to explore thefollowing language features:• Punctuation associated withconversation.• How exclamation marks emphasisemeaning.

Being a text userWhat kind of book is this? How do youknow?What does the first sentence of thestory tell you about the kind of story itis?The book says that the story is ‘Retoldby Sara Oldfield.’ What does the word‘retold’ mean?

Being a text criticWould other couples waste their wisheslike the couple in the book?Would you?The illustrator has drawn the man andwoman in a cartoon style. Would thestory be different if the illustrationslooked more like real people?

Responding to textChildren could make masks ofthe characters and some props

related to the story. These could beused to practise and perform areaders theatre of the book.

Children could retell the storyas a comic. Provide large paper

folded into eighths for the cells.Encourage the use of speech balloonsto show direct speech.

Children could list the words inthe book that indicate how the

man and woman were speaking.(screamed, cried, said angrily)

Writing linksShared guided writingSelect a traditional tale known to thechildren.How could we retell this story? Whatwould we do to make it interesting?Which parts of the story would we putinto the words? Which parts would weshow in the pictures?Write some of the story together.

Independent writingChildren could retell a traditionaltale of their own choice. Encouragethem to innovate on these tales or totell them in different ways, e.g., as acomic, a slide show or a play.

AssessmentCan the child:• Explain what kind of story ‘The Three Wishes’ is?• Explain the use of the thinking clouds in the illustrations?• Say what kind of people they think the man and woman are?

whole text activity sentence activity word activity

The Three WishesRetold by Sara OldfieldIllustrated by Alex Stitt

alphakidsTeacherEdition

Topic: Traditional talesCurriculum link: EnglishText type: NarrativeReading level: 16Word count: 373Vocabulary: man, woman, happy, rich, wished,wish, fairy, appeared, disappeared, beautiful,famous, sick, miserable, healthy, poor, hungry,sausages, nose, scarf, jewels, necklace

Possible literacy focusIdentifying conventions used in traditional tales:‘Once upon a time…’, ‘Retold by…’.Gaining meaning from the text and the illustrations.Exploring characterisation within the story.

SummaryThis book is a retelling of a traditional tale abouta couple who were granted three wishes butwasted them by mistake.

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