To engage with the text and main character

Key Stage 2

English

A Career in Computer Games by Anthony Horowitz

﻿Hello, my name is Ms. Henman. And I am going to be teaching you for reading today. In fact, I'm going to teach you every reading lesson in this unit, which I am very excited about. And we are studying one of my favourite texts. I didn't read it until I was an adult and I wish I had discovered this book when I was younger. Okay, I hope you're ready to learn. Let's get going. Okay, let's go through our agenda for today. First, I'm going to introduce to you the author. Then I'm going to introduce to you the text that we're studying. And finally, we're going to read the start of the story and think about the main character in it. For this lesson, you're going to need an exercise book or a piece of paper, so something to write on. You're going to need a pencil or a pen, so something to write with. And you're going to need your best learning-brain. To help yourself concentrate in this lesson, make sure you don't have any distractions, that your phone's turned off, and that you're in a quiet space. If you need to get those things or get your learning space ready, please pause the video and do that now. Otherwise, let's get going. So this scary image is actually part of the front cover of this book. I want you to have a look at it and look at what you can see, and how you feel about it. You might want to pause the video as you do this, to give yourself some extra thinking and looking time. So, I think it looks like a skull, a human skull. That's the bones in our head. And it looks like it's been covered in cobwebs. It makes me feel a bit scared. And it reminds me of some of the images that we might see around Halloween. This is the full cover of the book. So now you can study what it looks like. And we need to have a look, can you find the authors name? I'm going to give you a clue. Great, let's say it together. Anthony Horowitz, your turn. I didn't hear you, let's try again. My turn, then your turn, Anthony Horowitz. Great, much better. You may have read other books or series by him. He wrote all of The Diamond Brothers series, for example. In fact, he has published over 40 books. That's a lot of books. This is another series that he published, the Alex Rider series. Have you read, or heard, or watched any of them? Thumbs up, thumbs down? Yeah, I bet you have. It is estimated that 90 million copies of this series have been sold worldwide. That's incredible. At least 90 million people have read this book, this series. Anthony Horowitz has also written plays and TV series. So he's a writer of children's books, he helps with the screenplays for the films. And he also writes plays, which are performed at theatres. And TV series that you might watch at home. What's the name of the book? I've given you a clue already. Yes, "Horowitz Horror." My turn, your turn. "Horowitz Horror." Excellent, and in fact, he's used his surname in part of the title. And both of those words begin with the letter H. Ha, ha, "Horowitz Horror." So it's an alliteration. Can you read that, what does it say? 17 chilling tales from the master of storytelling. What do you think this means? Pause the video and have a think. A tale is a story, which means this book is made up of 17 different short stories. So this book isn't just one long story. It's got 17 shorter stories within it. And chilling means scary. Have you ever heard the expression, a chill ran down my spine? Often that's when someone's a little bit scared and they feel something running down their spine, giving them the chills. This is the table of contents. So when you open the book, this is what you see inside. I just want you to have a look and study it for a second. Fantastic, my first question is what is the name of the second chapter, or the second short story? Have a look. Correct, Killer Camera. Oh, I just felt a chill, or a shiver, go down my spine. We are going to be reading chapter seven, or the seventh short story. What page would you turn to if you had the book in front of you? Have a look and pause the video if you need to. Okay, I'm going to seven. It's called A Career in Computer Games. And it's on page 153, excellent. We're just going to focus on some vocabulary which we will read in today's lesson, just to check that you know what it means. Career, my turn, your turn. Career, a career is an occupation or job done by a person for a significant part of their life. So my career is being a teacher. Qualification, your turn. A qualification is an examination or certificate that people work towards earning. An example would be GCSEs. My turn, your turn, salary. A salary is the money that's paid to a person who does the job, so I earn a salary. I am paid by my school to work for it. Newsagent. A shop or a person selling newspapers or magazines. I reckon most of you have stepped inside a newsagent before. This is what the chapter starts with. I'm going to show it to you in a second. It looks like an advert. Okay, I would like you to pause the video and read out loud the advert, or the text in front of you. Off you go. Fantastic reading, well done. I've got some questions for you. Would you like this job, and why? Which part is appealing? So, which part is interesting to you? So, would you like the job? Thumbs up, thumbs down, show me. Hm, lots of different responses. Okay, which part is appealing, or which bit is interesting to you? So, for me, I would quite like this job. I mean, I used to like computer games, but I'm not really that interested in them now. The bit that is appealing to me is this. The highest salary paid. I'd love to earn lots and lots of money and to get bonuses. Also, it says fit, enthusiastic person. And I think I'm quite enthusiastic. And I quite like doing exercise. So that appeals to me, as well. No experience or qualifications needed. Well, I don't have any experience in computer games, but I do have qualifications. For example, I've got a degree that allows me to be a teacher. Hm, do I want this career? That's something to think about. It's my turn to read to you. "It was just a card like all the others, "in the window of his local newsagent, "but right from the start "Kevin knew the job had to be for him. "He was 16 years old and just out of school "and there were two things about him "that were absolutely true. "He had no experiences and no qualifications." Looking at this passage, what do you already know about Kevin, the main character? Hm, you can pause the video and have a look. What do you already know about him? Okay, now it's my turn. So I know his age, he is 16 years old and he's just out of school. So he's just finished his schooling. So that's two things I know. And then he's got no experience, so he hasn't worked before. And he doesn't have any qualifications. So he doesn't have any exams or any qualifications that would help him have a job in computing. So that's four things I know from him from just reading a few sentences. I would like you to get your piece of paper and your pencil, and write Kevin, the main character's name, in the middle of the piece of paper, because we're going to make a mind map. You can pause the video whilst you do that. Excellent, okay, so what were those things that we already know about him? Think back, ah, okay. He's 16 years old, you could write that one down. What else can you remember? Can you pause the video and write down everything that you remember about him? Off you go. I wonder if we remembered the same things, let's have a look. Okay, so we know his age. He's just finished school. He has no qualifications. He has no job experience. Did you get those things? Great, okay, let's keep reading. It's your turn to read this time. So you will need to pause the video in a second and read the text out loud. Before you start though, I'm just going to give you a little reminder. If a word starts with a capital letter, it usually means it's a proper noun. Unless it's at the beginning of the sentence. So, I have found two words that are capitalised, which I know are proper nouns. Moon Quest, now I haven't heard of Moon Quest before. But I think it's going to be a person, or it's going to be the name of something, or a place, or let's have a look. Ah, it's going to be the name of a game in this instance, okay? So you've been given a clue by me to help you understand it. Now I'd like you to pause the video and read out loud the text on the screen. Off you go. Fantastic reading, well done. So we just read quite a lot about Kevin. We're going to look at this in more detail. Before we do that, we're just going to check our vocabulary. Confiscated, well, that's a tricky one. Let's try again, confiscated. Excellent, it means taken or seized by a person in authority or power. So, I might confiscate something from a child in my class. That means I would take it away or I'd cease it. I'd take it away from them. Another word, weary. Oh, that's another tricky one, let's try again. Weary, excellent. It means that someone is tired from something, or tired of something, or bored of something. Do you think you've ever felt weary before? Mm, and there's that word, weary. "And when it was finally confiscated by a weary teacher "in the middle of the geography lesson." Why is Kevin's teacher described as weary? Pause the video and have a think. So I think the word suggests that his teacher is really tired and bored of Kevin playing computer games. It could also suggest that teachers work hard, and therefore might be tired or weary. I like to think that I work really hard. Okay, so now I'd like you to re-read the passage and consider what it tells us about Kevin, and what we can infer about his character and personality. So pause the video, re-read, and think about what we know about his character, or his personality. Off you go. So these are some of the things that I think I now know, or can make inferences from. So he loves games. "Even though it was against school rules." Hm, I'm going to make an inference from that, which is Kevin is prepared to break rules, that he's a rule-breaker, or maybe he's defiant. My turn, your turn, defiant. That means he defies school rules. He doesn't listen to them, he breaks them. Finally, "He'd gone straight out "and bought another new one." Hmm, this makes me think that he's really addicted to gaming because he couldn't survive without a game. Maybe also that he's got some money because he's able to afford another pocket computer straight away. And also maybe that he really is obsessed with gaming. He can't survive without it. That's how interested he is in it. He's also prepared to break the school rules again, because he's just had one taken away and he's buying another one. It's almost like he doesn't care about the rules. Okay, now it's your turn to read. So I'd like you to pause the video and read this passage out loud. Off you go. Fantastic reading, well done. "Kevin takes his schoolwork seriously." Do you think you agree or disagree with the statement? So do you agree that he takes it seriously or not? I want you to find evidence from the text to support your view. And I've given you a sentence scaffold there, so you can choose whether you agree or whether you disagree. So I agree because it says, and then you can include a quote. This makes me think that. And what those colours mean is, the purple means it's your point. So you agree or disagree. The pink is your evidence, and then the green-blue colour is your explanation. Now, you don't have to use this exact sentence scaffold. but I'd like you to have a go at answering this question and writing your answer down. So can you pause the video and have a go at that now, please? Excellent, now it's my turn. Excellent, now it's my turn. I disagree because it says in the text, Kevin threw his schoolbag. So you can see, I didn't take a big quote. I didn't quote a lot from the extract, just the verb, threw. As in the text, Kevin threw his school bag, which suggests he does not care for it, or treat it carefully and with respect. So, I've explained what the verb threw implies. In addition to this, so I'm making a second point, we are told, so I'm not quoting directly from the text, but I'm telling us what the text says. We are told he ignores his homework and prioritises his gaming, which he would not do if he took school seriously. So once again, I've explained what it means when he ignores his homework. That he doesn't take it seriously and thinks that gaming is more important. Can you get your mind map back out? So this is what we have on our mind map. What can we now add to our mind map? I'd like you to pause the video and add what you can write down about Kevin. What have you inferred? What do you know about his character? Off you go. Fantastic, now it's my turn. He loves playing computer games. Did you get that too? He breaks rules. He is, what was that word? Defiant, excellent, well done. He doesn't work hard at school or take it seriously. So we know that he plays games at school and that he doesn't take it seriously. If you would like, you can write down and magpie any of my ideas and put them onto your mind map. If you're going to do that, you need to pause the video. Okay, now it's my turn to read. You can track with your eyes as I read. "Kevin's bedroom was piled high "with computing magazines and posters. "It would also be true to say that he had never actually met "most of his best friends. "He simply exchanged messages with them on the internet, "mainly hints for games, the secret codes and shortcuts." My question to you is, Kevin had lots of friends, that's a statement, do you agree or disagree? Do you agree that he has lots of friends or do you disagree? Have a little thinking time. Well, I think it's a tricky question. So let's mind map what friends do. I want you to have a little pause and think about what do your friends do to you? What do they mean to you? How do you act with them? So, one thing that I thought about is that my friends make me laugh. Do your friends make you laugh? Another thing I thought about is that they hang out with me. They might play games with me. They might spend time with me, that's something that I consider important about friendships. So pause the video and have a think. How do you spend your time with your friends? What does friendship mean to you? Off you go. Great, now I'm going to show you some of the other ideas that I came up with. Friends might cheer me up if I'm sad. And they might support me. They communicate with me. So they might call or text me if I'm unable to see them. They might offer me advice if I need it. And I might offer them advice if they need it. They might suggest things I like. So for example, they might say, "Oh, this recipe is really good. "I suggest you try it at home." Or, "I heard this song or watched this film "and think you'd really enjoy it." So those are some of the things I think that friends do for each other. Let's go back. If you want, you can re-read this passage and then think about whether Kevin has lots of friends. Pause the video as you do that. So, what do you think? Does he have lots of friends? Well, I think it's still a tricky question. He hasn't met most of his best friends. So, for me, that's quite important, to hang out and spend time physically with my friends. But we're not always able to do that. So we might call, or text, or email each other. So, I suppose it doesn't matter that he doesn't always physically spend time with them, and that he communicates with them online. So maybe they are his friends. But how does he communicate with them? What does he communicate about? They give each other hints for games, secret codes, and shortcuts. Now, my friends offer me advice. So I suppose they are offering him advice. And they might be suggesting things that he'd like within the game. And I suppose they're hanging out and spending time online. But I think it's quite a narrow friendship. So they don't spend their time doing lots of things together. It's quite a specific friendship. So, although he does have friends, and there might be a few of them, I think those friendships are quite limited. That's my personal opinion. Okay, we've got our mind map. What am I going to add about friendships? Have a think about what you might add. So I've written, he doesn't have any friends in real life because I think most of his friends are online. I thought perhaps he is lonely. So, although friendships online might be helpful to him, if he doesn't have any friends in real life, he might feel a little bit lonely. I put it as a question mark, because I'm not entirely sure about that. If you want, you can magpie my ideas and add them to your mind map. Hm, can you read the question on the screen, please? Well, would you like to be his friend? Why or why not? Want you to pause the video and have a think. You can either say your answer out loud or you can write it down. It's important that you use the word because. Off you go. Wow, I think we've got a range of responses there. Congratulations, you have finished your first lesson. Now before we go, can you remember the name of the book? Correct, "Horowitz Horror." Can you name the name of the short story that we are studying? Something to do with computer games. Yes, A career in Computer Games. Who was the author again? Say it out loud. Excellent, Anthony Horowitz, well done. And I look forward to seeing you for our next lesson, bye.

To engage with the text and main character

To engage with the text and main character

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UnitEnglish / A Career in Computer Games by Anthony Horowitz

English