Focus Narrative:

Fantasy Stories 🔗

Key Text/Stimulus:

Dream Giver (Animation) 🔗

Writing Outcome:

Overview

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, you have been inspired by 'Dream Giver'. After hearing a mysterious story, the dreamer falls asleep—and the creature from the story begins to appear in their dream.

Writing Task

Write a fantasy dream sequence where a creature from a story enters the dream world. You might choose for it to slowly appear, just like in Dream Giver, or suddenly take over and twist the dream into something dangerous. Describe how the dream changes as the creature grows in power—does it chase, trap, or confuse the dreamer? Decide whether the dreamer escapes on their own or is rescued, linking back to how dreams are delivered and resolved in The Dream Giver.

Writing Focus

Use expanded noun phrases and precise vocabulary to describe the dream and creature. Build tension with varied sentence lengths and fronted adverbials, and organise your writing clearly from disruption to escape while showing the dreamer’s thoughts and feelings.

Focus Grammar

• Commas to clarify meaning or avoid ambiguity in writing
• Cohesion within a paragraph

Hot-seating as characters

Freeze frame

Conscience alley

Focus Non-Narrative:Imagery Poems 🔗

Key Text/Stimulus:

Dream Giver (Animation) 🔗

Writing Outcome:

Overview

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, you have been inspired by Dream Giver. The Dream Giver travels through the night, delivering dreams filled with colour, light and imagination.

Writing Task

Write an imagery poem that captures the role and world of the Dream Giver. Describe what the Dream Giver does, the sights and sounds of the dream workshop, and how dreams are created and delivered. You might focus on one moment (such as preparing a dream or releasing it into the sky) or describe the Dream Giver’s job across a whole night.

Writing Focus

Use rich, descriptive language and imagery to paint vivid pictures for the reader. Choose powerful nouns, verbs and adjectives, and experiment with figurative language such as similes, metaphors and personification. Consider line breaks and structure to shape meaning and create a sense of wonder.

Cross-curriculum support genres:

Comics

Pathway: Set Design 🔗

In this pathway pupils explore the work of set designers – in the first instance a set designer that works in theatre, and in the second instance a maker that creates sets for animation. Pupils go on to explore how they can create their own model set, inspired by a creative stimulus (poetry, prose, film or music).

Disciplines:

Set Design, Making, Drawing, Sketchbooks

Medium:

Paper, Card, Construction Media, Mixed Media, Paint, Drawing Materials

Artists:

Rae Smith, Fausto Melotti, Tiny Inventions, Rose Hurley, Gabby Savage-Dickson

How do artists use set design to create atmosphere and support a story?

Artists use set design to create atmosphere by carefully choosing colours, textures, shapes, and structures that reflect the mood, setting, and events of a story. They consider how the space will be viewed and used, arranging elements to guide the audience’s attention and enhance meaning. Through thoughtful design choices, the set helps bring the narrative to life and supports the storytelling.

Set design – The creation of a physical or imagined environment where a story takes place.

Atmosphere – The mood or feeling created within a space or artwork.

Composition – The arrangement of visual elements within a space to create a balanced and effective design.

Debate, discussions, hot-seating

What is puja and how does it show a commitment to god?Puja is a Hindu act of worship where Sanatanis pray and make offerings to God. It shows commitment by allowing them to regularly express devotion, gratitude, and respect.

How do Sanatanis worship and show devotion to the gods and goddesses?Sanatanis show their love and respect for the gods and goddesses by praying, singing songs (bhajans), offering flowers and food, lighting lamps, and visiting temples to ask for blessings.

Dharma – A person’s duty or way of living that follows moral and religious law.

Puja – A ritual of worship, often carried out at home or in a mandir, involving prayer, offerings, and devotion.

Bhakti – Loving devotion and dedication to God, shown through actions, prayer, and daily life.

Context Link

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, the team have been commissioned to create an educational animation that helps viewers understand how to navigate the world using maps. To do this successfully, they will need to build their knowledge of the United Kingdom and beyond by using the eight points of a compass, reading 4- and 6-figure grid references, and interpreting symbols and keys on Ordnance Survey maps. Their animation will need to clearly demonstrate how these skills help people find locations, understand landscapes, and explore both local and global environments.

What are the eight compass points? north, north-east, east, south-east, south, south-west, west and north-west.

What is an Ordinance Survey map? Ordnance Survey is Britain's mapping agency. O.S. maps show human and physical features of the environment e.g. land height, hills, valleys.

How do you find a specific place on a map? Using a 4 or 6 figure grid reference. A grid reference allows someone to mark a place on a map by referring to vertical and horizontal lines called 'eastings' and 'northings'. Along the corridor and up the stairs.

Compass Points – The eight main directions (north, north-east, east, south-east, south, south-west, west, north-west) used to describe location and direction.

Ordnance Survey (OS) Map – A detailed map of the UK that shows physical features (like hills and rivers) and human features (like roads and buildings).

Grid Reference – A way of locating a specific place on a map using eastings (across) and northings (up), often using 4 or 6 figures (“along the corridor and up the stairs”).

Pathway: Stuffed toys 🔗

Designing a stuffed toy and making decisions on materials, decorations and attachments (appendages) after learning how to sew a blanket stitch.

Core: Texiles

Giving instructions

Context Link

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, pupils will create an educational animation about animal gestation periods. To support this, they will design and make stuffed toy animals using textiles, choosing suitable materials and stitching techniques. These models will be used in their stop motion animation.

How are different stitching techniques used for different purposes in textile products?

Different stitching techniques are chosen depending on their purpose. Running stitch is useful for quick joining or temporary seams, back stitch creates strong, durable seams for parts that need to hold securely, and decorative stitches such as blanket stitch can be used to neaten edges or add visual detail. Selecting the appropriate stitch ensures the product is strong, functional, and visually effective.

Running Stitch – A simple stitch used for joining fabric or creating basic seams.

Back Stitch – A strong, secure stitch used for seams that need durability.

Blanket Stitch– A decorative stitch used to neaten edges and prevent fraying.

WOW! Wonder Launch

Big Question: How do caterpillars change as they grow?

Science Enquiry Focus: Observation over time

Outline: Each child receives a caterpillar mini habitat to care for and observe over several weeks. In the first session, children set up an observation record to track changes such as size, colour, shape, and texture. They revisit their caterpillar regularly, noting and drawing any changes as it grows and eventually forms a chrysalis.

What to Wonder? What changes can we see each day?How does the caterpillar’s body change over time?When does it stop looking like a caterpillar?What might happen next?

Investigations:

Do larger animals have longer life cycles?

Enquiry Focus: Pattern seeking

Outline: Collect data on life cycle lengths of different animals (e.g. elephant, frog, butterfly, chicken). Look for patterns between size, lifespan and development stages.

What to wonder? Do bigger animals always live longer? Which animals grow the fastest?Why might life cycles vary?

Context Link

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, the team have been commissioned to create an engaging educational animation that explains the life cycle of a plant or animal. Their challenge is to bring each stage to life clearly and accurately, showing how living things grow, change and reproduce over time, so that viewers can understand these important scientific processes in a fun and memorable way.

Cross Curricular Writing Opportunity:

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, children will create a comic to complement their life cycle animation, combining science knowledge with creative writing. They will use sequenced panels, captions, and speech to clearly explain each stage, applying accurate vocabulary while adapting their writing to suit a comic style and purpose.

How do animals reproduce? Animals reproduce sexually. Through the union of sperm and egg, Males produce sperm that can fertilise the egg released by females during a process called ovulation. The fertilised egg can develop into offspring which are like both parents.

How do plants reproduce? Plants reproduce to make new plants through sexual and asexual reproduction. Pollination is picked up from the anthers by a pollinator and transported to the stigma of another flower. Fertilisation then occurs. Fertilisation is the process of pollen joining with an ovule causing the ovule to become a seed. Asexual reproduction produces offspring which are a copy of the parent.

What are the life cycles of mammals, amphibians, reptiles, insects and birds? Mammals are born live, grow into adults, and have babies; amphibians hatch from eggs, often start life in water (like tadpoles), then grow legs and lungs; reptiles hatch from eggs or are born live, growing into adults with scales; insects hatch from eggs, go through stages like larvae and pupae before becoming adults; and birds hatch from eggs, grow feathers, learn to fly, and become adults who lay eggs.

What is the life cycle of a plant? There are the 5 stages of plant life cycle. The seed, germination, growth, reproduction, pollination, and seed spreading stages.

Sexual Reproduction – reproduction involving two parents where sperm and egg join, producing offspring that are similar but not identical to the parents.

Asexual Reproduction – reproduction that involves one parent and produces offspring that are identical to the parent.

Fertilisation– when a sperm cell joins with an egg cell to begin the development of a new organism.

Ovulation– the release of an egg from the female reproductive system.

Pollination– the transfer of pollen from the anther to the stigma of a flower, often by insects or the wind.

Metamorphosis – the process of change an animal goes through during its life cycle (e.g. caterpillar to butterfly).

Online Safety

Lesson 5: Online Health 🔗

Learning how technology can affect our health and wellbeing and coming up with ways to replace bad online habits with good online habits.

Creating Media

Stop-motion animation 🔗

Pupils learn how to create animations using Stop Motion Studio.

Context Link

Working as animators at Portal Animation Studios, the team create stop motion animations based on their commissions across Geography, Science and English.

Oak Academy

Compose and Create: composing a minor melody on a stave 🔗

Language Angels Unit 🔗

• En la cafetería (At the Café )