Roald Dahl for me, can be described as one of the greatest authors of children’s writing of all time. A literary genius, who was able to create an air of magic in his writing with such ease, and made readers fall in love with the characters as though real, his novels are timeless which is why I loved incorporating them into my lessons. Suitable for all ages, I found that if my students were able to read fairly well, I could use Roald Dahl’s novels to do activity based lesson plans for a few weeks, to really help my learners dig deeper into the text and have fun exploring the novel while they read. Here are a few of my ideas to use with ‘The Witches’.
1. Make notes on how to identify a witch
After reading Chapter 1, ask your student to write down as many bullet points as possible about how to identify a witch. This is a great way of introducing bullet pointing to your students, showing them that their information needs to be clear and concise. This exercise can also be used to introduce using quotations in work in order to provide evidence for their notes.
2. Provide short summaries and drawings of the children who disappeared
In Chapter 2, we learn about five children who vanished because of witches and their use of magic. Get your students to make a book, detailing what happened to each child, and drawing a picture to match. Why not ask them to make up their own character and the backstory as to how they vanished too!
3. Write a Missing Poster
If you haven’t read the book, then I don’t want to give away anything, but once you finally get to this point in the story, write a missing poster for the character who disappears. Talk with your students about what they think would be included on a missing poster using a spider diagram, and then have them create a real one. You could even crumple the paper and use old teabags to stain the paper to make it look authentic, but don’t forget the mugshot of the person in the middle!
4. Get the thinking caps on!
Again, without giving anything away, one of the characters gets turned into a mouse by a wicked witch. Ask your student to imagine themselves waking up in the morning and discovering they have turned into a mouse. Tell them to describe what they can see, hear, feel and really explore the sensations of being a mouse through their writing. This is a great way to explore creativity through the five senses, and really allow your children to use their imagination.
