Week 2 (Descriptive Setting - Dark Fantasy)

Monday 9th November 2020

L.O. To summarise a text by identifying the key events

Watch the trailer to the film adaptation (link above) and summaries what you saw in the two or three sentences.

Next: read the first three pages of the Chapter 1 (below) and summarise what you have read. Think about these three questions:

What characters have we met so far?

Where is it set?

What happens?

Tuesday 10th November 2020

L.O. To identify pro-nouns

To recap and review what pronouns are and learn some new knowledge about the different types of pronoun - read the Powerpoint slideshow below.

Then read page 11 of the Dark is Rising (above) and identify all the pronouns.

Then - can you identify who 'him' is in the first line?

Who are 'they' at the beginning of the fourth paragraph?

L.O. To identify figurative language

What figurative language is used in paragraph four to describe the snow?

It has been used twice - what do the words say about the snow?

Why do you think this?

Can you spot this technique again in the paragraph starting with the words 'booted and muffled'?

Do you know what a symphony orchestra is? If not, research the meaning in a dictionary or on the internet.

Make notes on your answers to all the above questions on your own copy of the text.

Wednesday 12th November 2020

L.O. To plan a story using key words and phrases

Using the writing plan below we will start to plan our own version of a story similar to the opening scene from the Dark is Rising in pages 11-13 above.

Have a look at the plan below and think of the following questions for each section, then complete the writing plan using key words and phrases (not sentences):

Paragraph 1 (Character and setting)

What is the name of your character?

How old are they? Is it their birthday tomorrow or in the next few days?

Do they have any siblings? (Do they barge into the room they are in?)

Where is your character? In their bedroom? Sat on the windowsill?

What are they doing? Looking out of the window?

What time is it? Evening? Tea time?

What can they see? Snow covered fields and hills? Dark skies? Trees without leaves?

How are they feeling? Sad, because there will be no snow on their birthday?

Who comes into their room? What do they say?

Paragraph 2 (Busy household setting)

Where in the house does your character go next?
Is it noisy? Why? What is making the noise? (Is it in a kitchen where someone is cooking and radio is on very loud?)

What strange thing happens when your character walks past something? (Does the radio make a funny noise? Does the smoke alarm go off even though there is no smoke?)

Does the mum or dad ask the character to go outside and do a job for them? (Empty the recycling bins?)

Paragraph 3 (More strange things happen)

What is it like outside when your character steps outside? Is it really quiet? Is it dark? Is it cold?

Where does your character go next? How do they walk? 
What do they see suddenly? (Cats stood on each recycling bin? Staring at the character?)

How do the animals look that are behaving strangely? (Eyes staring into the character? Making any strange noises?)

How does your character feel at this point? (Frozen to the spot? Hairs standing up on the back of their neck?)

Make notes on your plan ready to write your own story.

Using a dictionary or the internet research the meaning to the list of words in the dictionary list above.

Think of how you could use two or three of the words, that you have not used before, in your story and add the words to your 'Word Bank' on your writing plan.

Friday 13th November 2020

Spelling Test

Get someone to test you on the weekly spellings from this weeks spellings (see list on Class Page link below).

L.O. To use figurative language

Using your writing plan and thinking about how we learned about figurative language in the text, practice writing sentences for your own story, using figurative language.

Focus on paragraph one of your writing plan and the setting for the story - what can your character see from the window?

Try to use personification like we saw in the text.