What Is Retelling
Retelling is asking a reader to recount the events, characters, and sequence of a story or passage in their own words, without looking back at the text. Unlike summarizing, which boils content down to main ideas, retelling captures the narrative flow and often includes details the reader found important.
Retelling serves as a window into comprehension. When a child retells a story, you see what they actually understood, what they filtered out, and where their processing broke down. For struggling readers and those with dyslexia, retelling reveals whether comprehension gaps stem from decoding issues, working memory limitations, or weak understanding of story structure.
Why It Matters
Retelling is a diagnostic tool and intervention strategy combined. Research in literacy instruction shows that students who can retell text demonstrate stronger overall comprehension than those who cannot, regardless of reading level. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) includes retelling as a measure of reading proficiency in grades 1-3 because it correlates directly with long-term reading success.
For students on IEPs, retelling tasks help special education teams track progress objectively. Rather than relying on test scores alone, teachers can document whether a student's retelling includes beginning, middle, and end, whether sequence is accurate, and whether character motivation appears. This data informs decisions about intervention intensity and whether decoding instruction (like Orton-Gillingham) is sufficient or whether comprehension-specific strategies are needed.
How to Use Retelling
- Informal assessment: After reading a picture book or short passage aloud, ask your child to tell you what happened. Don't prompt or correct. Listen for sequence, character names, and whether they grasp cause and effect.
- With struggling readers: If a child reads at a lower level than their grade, retelling at that instructional level shows whether comprehension is intact. A third grader reading at a first-grade level should still retell with beginning, middle, and end structure.
- For dyslexia support: Pair retelling with audiobooks or read-aloud sessions. If decoding is the barrier, removing that load lets you assess comprehension separately. Many students with dyslexia have strong listening comprehension once decoding isn't a factor.
- Using story elements: Teach children to retell by tracking characters, setting, problem, and solution. This framework makes retelling a taught skill rather than an assumed one, which is critical for students with weak story sense.
Retelling vs. Related Comprehension Strategies
Retelling differs from summarizing, which cuts details to focus on central meaning. A summary of "Charlotte's Web" might be: "A pig's life is saved by a spider's friendship and sacrifice." A retelling would include Wilbur arriving at the farm, meeting Charlotte, learning he'd be slaughtered, Charlotte writing in her web, and her death. Retelling is more complete; summarizing is more efficient.
Comprehension is the umbrella term. Retelling is one tool to measure it. Story elements are the framework students use to organize what they retell. Together, these form the foundation of reading instruction from kindergarten through middle school.
Common Questions
- Should I correct my child if they retell something wrong? No, not during the retelling itself. Let them finish, then ask gentle clarifying questions like, "What happened first?" or "Where were they?" Corrections during retelling interfere with assessment. Save teaching for the next reading session.
- What if my child can decode words but can't retell the story? This is a comprehension-specific gap, not a decoding issue. The student may have weak working memory, difficulty tracking multiple characters, or gaps in understanding sentence syntax. This typically requires comprehension strategy instruction beyond phonics or decoding programs.
- How does retelling fit into an IEP? Many IEPs for reading include measurable goals like, "Student will retell a grade-level narrative including 3 of 4 story elements with 80% accuracy on 4 of 5 trials." Retelling tasks are objective, repeatable, and directly observable, making them ideal for tracking progress toward reading standards.
Related Concepts
- Summarizing - condensing text to main ideas, distinct from retelling's narrative completeness
- Comprehension - the broader skill of understanding text, measured in part through retelling
- Story Elements - the framework readers use to organize and retell narrative structure