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Brilliant ways to bring MYSTERY AND MAYHEM to life in your classroom

Here are some creative ideas to inspire you to Share a Story. Share brilliant characters, amazing worlds, jaw-dropping adventures and talented authors and illustrators, both classic and contemporary.

1Start with a WOW!Pupils will work as a team to find

appropriate items on a list, agreeing interpretations.

In advance, prepare a scavenger hunt around the school, using outside areas, too. Try to make the items open to interpretation i.e. a tool, something with layers, a reflective surface, etc. Explain that you are going to read a detective story, but before you begin, you need to be sure of their ability to work with a partner and look for clues!

2Get up, get active. Pupils will explore how mysteries

drive a narrative plot.

Warm up by playing a game of Wink Murder! Explain that every detective story starts with a mystery – this could be something lost, some-thing found, an overheard conversation, etc. Challenge the class to think of all the mysteries they have read in stories. Ask pupils in groups to choose one mystery to rehearse and perform for the class, e.g. Harry Potter finding Tom Riddle’s diary, Mrs Twit getting “The Shrinks”. Can the class guess the mystery and retell how it develops?

3No pencils allowed.Pupils invent word definitions and

use these new words grammatically in a sentence. Have fun with fabricating alibis by playing the game Balderdash. Prepare some cards in advance with UNUSUAL WORDS (quizlet. com/12805759/balderdash-words- ash-cards) and their definitions. Read a word and ask pupils, in teams, to invent a definition, share their definition and model it in a sentence. Award points for the most inventive, before revealing the real definition. In Peter Buntzl’s fast-paced mystery, Lily

searches for her missing father in a Victorian world of mechanical robots. Whilst the robots in the story serve humans, they also have thoughts and feelings, so the book prompts interesting discussions about what it means to be human. Could a robot develop morality? Explore with your class what the world would be like if robots existed today in society.

7 Why not make this

your next book? Cogheart by Peter BunzlPublished by Usborne

Published by Penguin Random House

6 Keep the adventure going…

As you read the book, ask pupils to keep their own suspect lists, like those Hazel and Daisy compose on pp.145-7, with the headings Motive, Opportunity and Notes. Without reading ahead, challenge the class to try to solve the murder by collecting clues as you read.

Why not compare the characters of Wells and Wong to others in literature? What makes them unique? Can the class devise their own new detective and give them idiosyncratic traits and an interesting back-story?

5Word play.Pupils will locate explicit

and implicit character details in the book.

You will need large sheets of sugar paper, balls of string, scissors, Post-its, pens. Read chapters one to seven. Have the class seen a crime drama where the police collect evidence on a board to help them solve a case? As detective-duos, invite them to create their own evidence board to clarify who-knows-who. Use string to join those who have relationships and Post-its to comment on their feelings towards one another. Colour-code clues to show which are implicit and explicit.

4The writer’s workshop.

Pupils will make predictions about characters.

This activity can be done once you have read up to chapter seven. You will need the hall or playground and props to distinguish between the characters of Lord Hastings, Lady Hastings, Mr Cutis, Uncle Felix, Aunt Saskia and Miss Alston. Pupils will need Post-its and pens. Give six pupils a different prop each to become a key character. As you reread chapters 1-7 aloud, they should write down what they find out about the characters and stick it on them! Line the characters up and make predictions about their relationships.

Created in association with

Years 5&6

LESSON PLAN

Find more great ideas based on brilliant books at worldbookday.com/resources