Through Noi’s Eyes

Writing from a character's point of view.

Lesson from Grandma Bird series

Required reading: Whole book

Subjects

English
Food technology

Strategies used

Writing in Role

Purpose

Writing in role provides the opportunity to demonstrate an understanding of the critical events of the story. It also develops children’s abilities to empathise with characters and see things from a different point of view.

Preparation

Have available:

writing materials
a collection of postcards would be useful as some children may not have any experience of either sending or receiving one.
blank postcards.

Process

Start with the children’s experience.

Has anyone ever written or received a postcard?
Why do people send postcards?
Postcard used to be very popular before social media made it easy for people to post their holiday photographs online.

Introduce the word ‘correspondence’, which is used to describe an exchange of letters, postcards, or emails.

The most straightforward writing task is for Noi to send a short postcard home to his dad, comprising three to five sentences conveying his news about the events of the summer.

For a more challenging writing task, the children could write two postcards to dad. The first written on the day Noi arrives at the island expressing his uncertainty at staying with Grandma. The second one following the bird rescue.

Final reflection

Invite the children to consider whether they could imagine themselves as Noi when they were writing. Encourage honest reflection.

Did imagining that you were Noi make it easier or more challenging to write?

Key vocabulary

postcard, correspondence

Contributors

Sam Keeley

Formerly a teacher and local authority advisory teacher, Sam now works with Just Imagine as an English consultant and manager of the year 6 Reading Gladiators programme.

Nikki Gamble

Nikki Gamble
Director, Just Imagine
Nikki has worked extensively in schools across the UK and internationally. She is the author of Exploring Children’s Literature (4th edit) (2019) and co-author of Guiding Readers (2016) which was awarded the UKLA Academic Book of the Year Award 2017. Nikki is KS2 reading advisor and series consultant for Oxford University Press and content creator for the Oxford School Improvement and Oxford Owl websites. Nikki is Associate Consultant at the University of London, Institute of Education and Honorary Fellow at the University of Winchester