Story Ideas for When Your Child Says "Tell Me a Story"

The two-part trick

Every story you will ever need to improvise is the same shape:

One familiar thing. One small problem.

A sock that wants to find the other sock. A cat whose favourite step is occupied. A boot with a stone in it. Say what the thing wants, put something ordinary in the way, and you are already telling a story — the rest is just narrating until it resolves.

What makes this work is that a young child's interest is in the *thing*, not the plot. Your child's actual boot beats any invented kingdom, and they will supply most of the meaning themselves.

Thirty starters, sorted by how tired you are

Almost no energy required

1. A sock looking for the other sock.
2. A boot with a stone in it that will not come out.
3. The last biscuit, deciding who to be eaten by.
4. A door that only creaks on Tuesdays.
5. A spoon that is tired of soup.
6. The smallest key on the keyring, which has never opened anything.
7. A puddle that wants to be stepped in.
8. A jumper that has been put on backwards and rather likes it.
9. A pencil that has worn down to almost nothing.
10. The light that comes on when you open the fridge, wondering what it looks like when the door shuts.

A bit more in the tank

1. A cat who has found a warmer step and now has to explain this to the old step.
2. A snail who is late but insists on being on time.
3. Two birds arguing over a branch that could hold both.
4. A moon that gets stuck behind the same cloud every night.
5. A dog who has buried something and cannot remember what.
6. A tree in autumn deciding which leaf goes last.
7. A shell on a beach that has heard everything and says nothing.
8. A paper boat that only ever wanted a puddle, and gets a river.
9. A scarf blown into a hedge, meeting the birds who live there.
10. A lamp in an empty room, waiting for someone to come home.

Enough for a proper one

1. A child who wakes up and everything in the house is exactly one size smaller.
2. A bear who has slept through spring and has to be told what he missed.
3. A new kid at the gate and one swing built for two.
4. A dragon who is afraid of the dark and has to admit it.
5. Somebody who can hear what the rain is saying, but only in one room.
6. A shop that sells things people have lost, run by someone who lost something too.
7. Two otters and one crayon.
8. A very small umbrella on a very wet street.
9. A star that goes out for one night and comes back apologetic.
10. A grandmother's coat pocket that never quite empties.

Solve by noticing, not by winning

The ending that settles a child is usually somebody spotting something, not somebody beating something. The sock was inside the jumper the whole time. The high shelf was reachable from the other side.

Triumph raises the temperature. Noticing lowers it — which matters a great deal if this is happening at 7:30pm.

Let them steer, but keep the wheel

"What happens next?" invites either silence or dragons. Two options work far better: *does she look under the chair, or does she ask the cat?*

The child is genuinely steering, and you have not handed a blank page to someone who is nearly asleep.

If one of them turns out to be a keeper

Some of these become the story that gets asked for every night for a month, and then it is gone — because it only ever existed out loud.

Any of the thirty above can be typed in as a single sentence and come back as a complete book with pictures, if you want the keeper version to be something they can hold.

A few that already exist, in case one saves you the effort tonight:

• Two otters and one crayon
• The smallest umbrella on the street
• A new kid and a swing built for two

Turn one of these into a book →