Literacy Activities for Classic and Contemporary Texts 7-14

The Whoosh Book

Gill Robins, Laura-Jane Evans-Jones

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN:
  9781134963577
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

English teachers are always keen to explore new ways of motivating their pupils to engage with reading, both for learning and for pleasure. Literacy Activities for Classic and Contemporary Texts 7-14 is a practical, friendly book which uses the 'whoosh' to cover some of our best known classic and contemporary texts and offers a thoroughly enjoyable way for pupils to become part of the story, rather than just passive recipients of it. As an innovative and active learning strategy, the whoosh technique allows all students, regardless of gender, age, ability, learning need or command of language, to partake on an equal footing.

For younger pupils, the activities in this book provide an ideal way to internalise structure and key elements in story telling through physical response. For older students, they provide an enjoyable way to engage with challenging texts as well as facilitating the analysis of themes, issues, characterisation and setting. Students themselves become the story as its characters, sounds and even objects – once they are familiar with whooshing, many students will want to write and produce a whoosh of their own.

Classic authors and texts covered by this book include:-

• Aesop's fables, Greek myths and legends;
• Beowulf, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Oscar Wilde;
• Shakespeare (The Tempest, Twelfth Night, Hamlet, A Midsummer Night's Dream);
• Charlotte Bronte, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Robert Louis Stevenson, Mary Shelley;
• Andrew Norriss , Frank Cottrell Boyce, Nina Bawden, Michelle Magorian and much more...

You can use a whoosh to introduce a new text, to examine conflict, dilemma, plot, setting or characterisation, whoosh a controversial section of text to provoke discussion, or overcome reluctance to engage with archaic language by whooshing key sections of a story. Discussion starters, lesson objectives and follow-up activities are included throughout the text alongside the whooshes, and scripts enabling pupils to deliver dialogue are provided on the book's eResource.

This book is an invaluable resource, providing whooshes across a wide range of genres to meet the learning needs of children from 7 to 14, for both practising primary and lower secondary teachers.

1 Legends, myths and fables

1 Aesop's fables: The Lion and the Mouse

A fable is a short story which aims to teach children a particular moral point. Usually, fables are anthropomorphic, using animals as the central characters and giving them human characteristics. This structure is common to many cultures and is valued as a means of engaging children in stories whilst also teaching important lessons. Fables demonstrate one of the reasons why we tell stories – to pass wisdom and knowledge from generation to generation in a memorable and entertaining form.

Aesop is one of the most famous creators of fables. He was a slave and renowned story teller, who probably lived in ancient Greece in the fifth century BC. More than 650 fables are attributed to Aesop and although modern scholars question whether he actually created all of these tales himself, they are now famous and much-loved across the world.

Because fables are short, they are ideal for young children to act out in one session. The following Whoosh focuses on story structure.

Objective

• to consider story structure.

Characters	Objects	Sounds
Lion Mouse hunters other animals	sky sun rays from the sun grasses rope tree	swishing breathing roaring shouting

One afternoon, drowsy Lion fell fast asleep, with his head resting peacefully on his huge, soft paws. High up in a cloudless blue sky the burning sun shimmered, its rays reaching down to warm Lion’s fur as he slept. The long grasses swayed in the breeze, gently swishing in time with Lion’s steady breathing. Mouse, who was busily running up and down through the grass, grew bold and scuttled across Lion’s nose. Feeling a tickle, Lion opened one eye and stretched out a huge paw to catch Mouse and swallow him. ‘Forgive me,’ squeaked Mouse. ‘Please don’t hurt me. Let me go and one day I might be able to help you in return.’ Lion found this idea so funny that he lifted up his paw and let Mouse run away, before drifting back to sleep.

WHOOSH

A few weeks later, Lion was stalking proudly through the grass when he felt the tug of a rope around his feet. Lion twisted this way and that way, but the more he struggled, the tighter the rope became. As a group of hunters surrounded him, he roared with all of his might. The other animals shook with fear at the terrible sound, but the hunters just laughed as they tied Lion firmly to a tree. ‘We will keep this fine beast alive and take him to the King,’ they all agreed and they went off shouting in triumph to find a cart big enough to carry Lion.

WHOOSH

Mouse, who had heard the roars, found Lion struggling to break free from the ropes that bound him so tightly to the tree. With his little sharp teeth, Mouse soon nibbled right through the ropes and Lion found himself free. ‘I laughed at you, little Mouse’ boomed Lion, ‘because I didn’t think such a tiny creature could help someone so strong and brave as me. But you have saved my life.’ And so, that day, Lion learned that even little friends can turn out to be great friends.

WHOOSH

Follow-up activities

• If you are introducing the concept of story structure for the first time, draw a simple story frame with three consecutive sections labelled beginning, middle and end and explain the terms. Through shared discussion, recall together the key facts of the story, recording contributions in the correct box in word or picture form to show the sequence of events. A template is provided as Resource 1.
• If pupils have prior knowledge of story structure, use shared discussion to define the beginning, middle and end of the story, noting the content in each section. Paired discussion can be useful to assist recall of key facts. You could also use story tennis: a pair of pupils alternate to recall one fact from the story, expressing it in a single sentence.
• Provide confident or able pupils with a blank sheet of paper and challenge them to devise a three-section story plan with the key facts of each section of the story written or drawn in sequence.
• Using the outcome of these discussions, model the planning of a new fable in picture or word form. Discuss what needs to be created (characters, a plot and a meaning) and brainstorm ideas. Then ask pupils to do the same, individually, in pairs or in groups. Pupils could use Resource 1 as the planning format, recording their story plan and key vocabulary.
• If appropriate to age and ability, model the writing of a fable before asking pupils to write their own fable, either in words or pictures.

2 The Panchatantra: The Blue Jackal

This collection of Indian animal fables, some in verse and some in prose, probably dates back to the third century BC. In addition to becoming part of Hindu folklore, there are now many variations of the stories in other countries around the world. ‘Panchatantra’ is a Sanskrit word meaning ‘five principles’ and more than 80 stories are organised into five books, each of which centres on a different theme.

During this Whoosh, capture the action by taking digital pictures to use in the follow up activity. Take one image of each section of the Whoosh to use as an overview of the section, together with several other images which provide further detail. These images will then be used for sequencing, teaching paragraphing and internal paragraph structure.

Objective

• to analyse how the sequencing of a story creates coherence
• to develop an awareness of text cohesion through the use of paragraphs.

Characters	Objects	Sounds
Blue Jackal dogs monkeys lions tigers wolves Lion King jackals	desert village houses dye pot forest tree stump food forest entrance	barking splash forest howling

Resource 1 Story structure

One day, a tired, lonely jackal was wandering through the hot desert looking for his friends. He was desperately hungry, so as he drew near to a village he decided to search for food. He prowled quietly around the houses so that nobody would know that he was there. Suddenly, he heard the sound of barking – first one dog, then several. Scared of being caught, the jackal started to run. He was so determined to escape from the village that he did not notice the huge, round pot of blue dye that one of the villagers had left. He tried to stop, but it was too late. There was a loud splash, and in he fell.

WHOOSH

He lifted himself out of the dye pot only to find that he was completely blue. Getting hungrier with every step, Blue Jackal left the village and walked on until he stumbled into a forest. He looked around for his friends – he could see monkeys, lions, tigers and wolves, but no jackals. The a...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of resources
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Legends, myths and fables
• 2 Seven short stories
• 3 Plays
• 4 Classic novels
• 5 Modern novels
• 6 How to write a Whoosh
• Bibliography
• Indexes