This one-year collaborative study examined the role of narrative in promoting new forms of culturally responsive literacy learning in two contrasting international preschool contexts. The qualitative project was carried out by a U.S.-based teacher educator and a Palestinian-based teacher educator who examined the benefits of culturally responsive children's literature, child-centred and open-ended questions, narrative-based dictation and art activities, and co-constructed stories between parents and children. The findings indicate that small-scale changes in the use of narrative in literacy pedagogy can strengthen the classroom as a literacy community, foster culturally valued modes of thinking that deepen children's connections to stories, and strengthen children's engagement with a culturally responsive sense of aesthetic representation. The study's implications emphasise the power of narrative to deepen young children's engagement with literacy in contrasting international settings, and the productive role of cross-cultural collaborative research to diversify current definitions of high-quality early literacy education at the global level.