To engage with the text

Key Stage 2

English

The Giant's Necklace by Michael Morpurgo

﻿Hello, my name is Ms. Henman and I'm going to be your teacher for the whole of this guided reading unit. We are going to be studying a fantastic book and I'm looking forward to sharing it with you. Before we start, I just want to tell you about one thing that I often do, which is my turn, your turn. I say a word and then I would like you to repeat it out loud to the screen, should we practise with my name? Ms. Henman, excellent. Let's get going. Let's go through our agenda for today. First, we are going to introduce the author, so you will learn a little bit about the author of this book. Then I'm going to introduce the text. Then you are going to pre-learn some key vocabulary, which I think is crucial for understanding this book and then we're going to read a small extract from it. In this lesson you will need an exercise book or a piece of paper, you will a pencil or a pen and you will need your brain. To help your brain, you are going to need to have a quiet space with no distractions. Can you make sure that your workspace is ready, pause the video if you need to otherwise let's get going. first, I'm going to tell you a little bit about the author, who wrote the book that we're going to be studying and using for this unit. His name is Michael Morpurgo. My turn, your turn, Michael Morpurgo... I didn't hear you, let's try again, Michael Morpurgo... Excellent, that's much better. So Michael Morpurgo is a very famous world-renowned children's author. He has written a number of books and he has won a number of prizes for his books. I'm pretty certain you will have read at least one or two of his books before you even study this unit, so that is a fantastic start. One of the books that you may have heard of, or of the stories you may have heard of, is a story called War Horse. Now on the left hand side of the screen, you can see the front cover of the book War Horse and I can see one, two, three horses and illustrated on top of them are three soldiers. I can also see in the middle of the screen, another horse, but this horse seems to be made out of mechanical engineering thing, materials, so wood or metal, and he seems to be controlled by some actors, which is exactly what's happening. War Horse was adapted into a play and put on at a theatre, and the horse itself was a giant puppet. So if you study the picture carefully, you can see the horse's legs are actually human legs and so underneath the costume are two humans controlling the way the horse moved. Now this happened in 2007 and it was portrayed by The National Theatre, and it was huge and continued to be shown at the theatre for a number of years. The story that Michael Morpurgo wrote, was later adapted by Steven Spielberg into a film which was released in 2011. So one small children's book had a big impact in the entertainment industry. Two other books that you might have heard of, but are my personal favourites of Michael Morpurgo, are a book called Shadow and Adolphus Tips. So Shadow is one of my favourite books because it's got a dog in and I love dogs. I would like you to pause the video and just study what you can see. Excellent, so I can see for the book Shadow, a dog at the front and I can see a soldier, and a young child and some army helicopters. It looks like it's set maybe in the desert, maybe during war time, perhaps that's why there are soldiers and helicopters there. The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips, I can also see an animal in a similar position on the front cover. Interestingly, the people who created these front covers were different people, so there were different illustrators for these two books, however, they have depicted a similar thing. Both books have animals on the front and in the background of both books, I can see war machinery and soldiers. So behind the cat, I can see a tank and I can see some soldiers lying on the ground. So I've talked about three books so far, War Horse, Shadow, Adolphus Tips. What do they all have in common? Pause the video and have some thinking time, off you go. They've got two things in common, first all three books have animals in, cat, dog, horse. Second, all three books seem to be about war or have an element, or a theme of war and conflict running through them. So I think these are topics that Michael Morpurgo typically writes about or uses to inspire his writing. Now I'm going to introduce the book that we will be studying in this unit. If I were to make a prediction, I might assume that this book has an animal in and is set at wartime, we will have to wait and see. I would like you to really carefully study the front cover. Pause the video and tell me what you can see, off you go. Okay, now it's my turn. I can see a young girl who is standing on some rocks, down by her feet there is a blanket or maybe a shawl and some pebbles or something, there's a pattern. I can see quite a rough, dark sea and I can see grey ominous, intimidating clouds on the horizon in the sky. I can also see that the book is written by Michael Morpurgo and I can see the name, the title of this book. What is the title of this book, say it out loud please. You didn't do a full sentence, the title of this book is, off you go. Excellent, the title of this book is The Giant's Necklace. My next question is, what clues does the front cover give you about the story? So having looked at the story, do think you know anything about the setting, the protagonist, which means the main character. My turn, your turn, protagonist, protagonist, main character or the genre. So the type of story, whether it's a adventure story, a fantasy story, a mystery story, ghost story. Does this front cover give you any clues about the story, pause the video and have a little think, off you go. Excellent, fantastic thinking, I know you're already working really hard in this guided reading lesson. This is an illustration from the inside of this book, what clues does the illustration and the title give you about this story. Pause the video and have a think, what do you think the story might be about, off you go. Okay, now it's my turn. I think that this story might be about a young girl who we saw on the front cover, who forms a relationship with a giant and I think this might be the giant's necklace, and somehow that links the two characters. I think this necklace belongs to the giant, looking at the title, why do I think this necklace belongs to the giant, why have I made that inference? What do you think? It's a piece of punctuation, it's an apostrophe, the apostrophe there is for possession, so the necklace belongs to the giant. So I think this necklace that is illustrated belongs to the giant. Now I'm going to tell you a little bit about where the story is set, when we looked at the front cover we saw the sea, and that is correct. This book is set in Cornwall, Cornwall, excellent. And Cornwall is in the Southern part of the UK. And if you look at the map on the left hand side, you can see that the UK is in green and the Southern tip is in red, and that area is called Cornwall. On the blue map, you can see a zoomed in version of the map and so that blue area are key town's in Cornwall. Where it goes from blue to white, that's where the coast is so everything that is white, is where the sea is. And this book is set near St Ives, so can you look at the map really carefully and see if you can find St Ives. Your clue is, is that it's on the coastline. Excellent, it's at the very bottom, just North of Penzance, so that is where this story is set. We already know an incredible amount about this story and we haven't even read it yet. So what I would like you to do is to create a mind map, you are going to need to write the name of the book, The Giant's Necklace, in the middle of your paper and don't forget the apostrophe. And then I would like you to write down what you know, I have started with where it is set, so I wrote it is set in Cornwall by the sea. And then I've given myself a heading for some of my ideas, can you read that out loud to me? Excellent, predictions and inferences from the front cover or title. So that is, how I would like you to set up your mind map and I would like you to write down your own, personal predictions and inferences that you thought of when we looked at that front cover, and when we discussed the title. I think this task is going to take you two or three minutes, pause the video and off you go. Fantastic, I would like to show you mine now. So I'm going to tell you some of my own predictions and inferences, if you would like to take any of them and write them down on your mind map at any time, you can pause the video and magpie my idea and write it down. So I think the main character is a young girl, I think the sea in the picture was a bit wild and maybe she's a bit wild too. I saw her hair was blown around by the wind and she's facing this angry looking cloud and angry looking sea, which makes me think that she's maybe quite brave and maybe a little bit wild as well. I think she likes being by the sea. If there was, it looked like there was maybe a storm coming and I think someone who really didn't like being by the sea, and didn't like being outside, wouldn't be standing on those rocks. Now my next heading I have put is questions, so that is questions that I have that aren't answered yet. So one of my questions is, is there a giant, so we haven't met a giant, so is there actually a giant? I would like you to pause the video and to write your own subheading, questions, and write down at least three questions that you have about this book. I think this task is going to take you two minutes, off you go. Wow, I recon you've come up with some even more interesting questions than I have, but I am going to show you mine. So I want to know if there's a giant, I also want to know who the necklace belongs to, I want to know why the weather is ominous. My turn, your turn, ominous. Excellent, ominous is a feeling that you might get when something bad is about to happen and often the weather shows us that something might be about to happen, bad is about to happen in stories or in films. If you would like to write down and magpie any of my questions, of course you can. Now I'm going to teach you and you're going to learn, some key vocabulary text. Boat cove, excellent, and it is a noun. You can see a picture of a cove, this is quite a big cove But what you can see is that the land curves inward like a basin, and that boats can go and sit there. And often boats will put their anchor down in these coves because they're quieter from the weather. So there will be less wind and the waves will be less intense. Some boat coves have beach and a shoreline along them, others don't and they're more rocky. This ones a really big one, but some are . I've also said that Boat Cove is a proper noun and in this book it's got a capital letter, so if it's a proper noun, it's a person or a place. So in this case, I think maybe one of the beaches in the book is called Boat Cove. You can now add to your mind map, so you might want to put a new subheading, key vocabulary. You can put in boat cove and then you can put in your own definition, I'm going to read you mine. Part of the coast where boats can anchor, semi-colon, it's a separate idea, it might have a beach or a shore . Okay, pause the video and write down your new piece of vocabulary, off you go. Excellent. Cowrie shells, I didn't hear you, cowrie shells. Also a noun and I put a picture of six of them up on the screen, so these shells can be found along the shoreline, so either on the rocks or on the sand, depending on what the surfaces is. And you can see they've got this beautiful pattern, do they remind you of anything that we've seen so far this lesson? Yes, they look like the beads on the necklace, I'm going to show you on the screen, that's the beads on the necklace in my book. So I think beads might be made out of these shells. Yup, you know it, you've got to record your new piece of vocabulary, pause the video and do that now please. Our next piece of vocabulary is also a noun. My turn, your turn, tin mine. Excellent, so tin is a type of metallic material and a mine is a tunnel or a cave that has been partially dug out by humans, so they can go underground and dig for natural resources. Have you ever heard of a gold mine? Have you ever heard of a coal mine? Correct, so a tin mine is just a variation of that and there used to be lots of tin mines in Cornwall. Now this lovely illustration is actually from a different book, which features a mine, but I thought it showed quite clearly what a mine might look like if you were underground. This is a photograph, quite a wide mine, so you can see that the tunnel is quite wide and you can also see that there are tracks for the people to move what they dig up, out, so that they can collect it more easily and they don't have to carry it. Now, this mine has electricity, mines didn't really have electricity, they were very dark and very damp, and very cramped. So this mine makes it look a little bit nicer than perhaps it actually was. Excellent, you can now add tin mine to your mind map. I have written old, closed mines in Cornwall where tin used to be extracted. I've also written how they make me feel, so I think they're a little bit scary, dark, they're underground and I think they'd be a bit cramped. Just imagine what it might be like to be in a tin mine. Can you pause the video and write down your thoughts now please. Fantastic, I want you just to look at your mind map and see how much you already know, and have already thought about this book, and we haven't even read anything yet, isn't that incredible. So before the lesson ends, we are going to read a little extract from this book, you ready? This is the very first part of the story, I'm going to read it to you so you can follow with your eyes and enjoy. The necklace stretched from one end of the kitchen table to the other, around the sugar bowl at the far end and back again, stopping only a few inches short of the toaster. The discovery on the beach of a length of abandoned fishing line draped with seaweed had first suggested the idea to Cherry, and every day of the holiday since then had been spent in one single-minded pursuit, the creation of a necklace of glistening pink cowrie shells. She had sworn to herself and to everyone that the necklace would not be complete until it reached the toaster, and when Cherry vowed she would do something, she invariably did it. I would like you to pause the video now and to have a go at reading it out loud yourself, off you go. Excellent reading, well done. So from this very short extract, what do we already know, so do we know her name? Do we know what she's doing? Do we know how she feels? Maybe a little bit about her character? What can you already add to your mind map? I would like you to pause the video and to write down what you already know, off you go. Okay, now it's my turn, these are some of the things that I'm pretty sure I know, having read this small part of the story. The protagonist is called, Cherry, she is creating a very long necklace made out of cowrie shells, which she has been doing every day since she had the idea and she is determined. And you can now see that I've added it to my mind map, if you would like to take any of my inferences and anything that I wrote down on my mind map now, you may pause the video and do that. Otherwise we have one last thing to do, I would like you to read the statements below and to decide whether they are true or false. Pause the video and press play when you're ready. Are you ready, are you sure? Okay, she is single minded, that means that her mind is focused on one thing, what is that one thing that she's focused on? Correct, completing the pink cowrie necklace. Cherry has finished making her necklace. No, she has not, she vowed it would go all the way to the toaster, at the moment this is not long enough. Cherry was inspired to make her necklace by nature. True, she saw a washed up fishing line, draped and wrapped in seaweed and that's what inspired her to make this necklace. Congratulations, you have finished lesson one in this unit. I am super impressed and feel very proud of all the hard work that you have done in this lesson. I'll see you next time, bye.

To engage with the text

To engage with the text

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UnitEnglish / The Giant's Necklace by Michael Morpurgo

English