Skip to content
LessonPrint

Retell with the Key Details is a free printable Grade 1 English worksheet on retelling a story without losing what matters, aligned to Common Core standard RL.1.2. It prints 2 questions with an answer key on its own sheet of paper, in 25 versions that each ask different questions, so no two pupils in the class work from the same page. Print it from the browser or download it as a PDF — no account, no email.

Set 16 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

Next setLesson plan

One paper per pupil

12345678910111213141516171819202122232425

Set 1 has all 25 in a single PDF. All 25 sets ask different questions.

Retell with the Key Details

RL.1.2

NameDate

Read the story, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

The Blue Door

At the end of the lane stood a house with a blue door. Nobody had lived there for years. The grass grew as high as Tomas. One Saturday a van pulled up. A woman got out with a ladder and a tin of paint. By teatime the blue door was bright yellow. Tomas waved. The woman waved back. "I'm Nita," she called. "Come and see the garden when I've cut it."

  1. 1. How does the beginning of this story set it up?
  2. 2. Retell the story in your own words.
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Too Loud

The school band practised in the hall every Thursday. Sam played the drum. He liked it best when he could hit it hard. "Softer," said Mrs Otu. "The flutes cannot be heard." Sam did not want to play softly. But he tried it. This time he could hear the flutes too, winding above the drum like a bird. It sounded better than anything he had played before.

  1. 1. Retell the story in your own words.
  2. 2. How does the story begin?

LessonPrint · RL.1.2 · Set 16 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — Retell with the Key Details

Set 16. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. It shows the house empty and overgrown, so the change is a surprise. 2. An empty house at the end of the lane got a new owner, Nita, who painted the blue door yellow and waved to Tomas.
  2. 2.1. Sam liked hitting his drum hard, his teacher asked him to play softly, and it sounded better when he did. 2. It tells us when the band practises and what Sam played.

More practice for RL.1.2

Retell a story with its key parts, and say what it was trying to teach.

Teaching this next? Retelling, and What the Story Teaches is the 40-minute plan for it, with the misconceptions to expect.

All Grade 1 worksheets

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to RL.1.2 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.