Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson It is 1910. Orphaned when her parents die in a train crash, Maia is given the opportunity to join her distant relatives who run a rubber plant in Brazil. Accompanied by her governess, Miss Minton, who has her own reasons for making the journey, Maia’s finds her new family life in South America is not quite as she expected. And it is not long before she is drawn into high adventure deep in the Amazon. The winner of the Smarties Book Prize Gold Award and shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal, Journey to the River Sea is an exciting adventure story with themes of family and class, each individual’s responsibility for their own actions, the importance of embracing new experiences and of choosing your own outlook on life. Overall aims of this teaching sequence. • To explore a longer, character driven narrative. • To explore complex characterisation. • To read widely and for pleasure. • To develop and articulate opinions on a fictional narrative. • To explore and debate key themes within a narrative. This teaching sequence is designed for a Year 5 or Year 6 class. Overview of this teaching sequence This teaching sequence is approximately four weeks long if spread out over 20 sessions. The book supports teachers to explore with children a fast-paced, character driven narrative, which addresses highly relevant issues for discussion and debate, and which offers excellent opportunities as a model for children’s own narrative writing and structures. National Curriculum objectives covered by this sequence Reading: (Word reading / Comprehension) Writing: (Transcription / Composition) . Read and discuss an increasingly wide . Identify the audience for and purpose range of fiction, poetry, plays, non- of the writing, selecting the fiction and reference books or appropriate form and using other textbooks. Read books that are similar writing as models for their own. structured in different ways and . Note and develop initial ideas, drawing reading for a range of purposes. on reading and research where . Increase their familiarity with a wide necessary. range of books, including myths, . Draft and write by describing settings, legends and traditional stories, characters and atmosphere and modern fiction, fiction from our integrating dialogue to convey literary heritage, and books from other character and advance the action. cultures and traditions. Evaluate and edit by assessing the . Identify and discuss themes and effectiveness of their own and others’ conventions in and across a wide range writing. of writing. Propose changes to vocabulary, ©The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education. You may use this teaching sequence freely in your school but it cannot be commercially published or reproduced or used for anything other than educational purposes without the express permission of CLPE. Ask questions to improve their grammar and punctuation to enhance understanding. effects and clarify meaning . Draw inferences such as inferring characters’ feelings, thoughts and motives from their actions, and justifying inferences with evidence. Predict what might happen from details stated and implied. Participate in discussions about books that are read to them and those they can read for themselves, building on their own and others’ ideas and challenging views courteously. Explain and discuss their understanding of what they have read, including through formal presentations and debates, maintaining a focus on the topic and using notes where necessary. Provide reasoned justifications for their views. Speaking and Listening: . Pupils should be taught to ask relevant questions to extend their understanding and knowledge, articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions, give well-structured descriptions, explanations and narratives for different purposes, including for expressing feelings, participate in discussions, presentations, performances, role play, improvisations and debates, and consider and evaluate different viewpoints, attending to and building on the contributions of others. Cross Curricular Links: Geography . Children should understand geographical similarities and differences through the study of human and physical geography of a region of the United Kingdom, a region in a European country, and a region within North or South America. Children should describe and understand key aspects of: physical geography, including: climate zones, biomes and vegetation belts, rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, and the water cycle. Art and Design . Pupils should be taught to develop their techniques, including their control and their use of materials, with creativity, experimentation and an increasing awareness of different kinds of art, craft and design. ©The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education. You may use this teaching sequence freely in your school but it cannot be commercially published or reproduced or used for anything other than educational purposes without the express permission of CLPE. Music . Pupils should be taught to improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the inter-related dimensions of music Teaching Approaches Writing Outcomes . Reading Aloud and Rereading . Poetry . ‘Tell Me’ – Booktalk . A note to a friend . Role on the Wall . Diary entries . Reading Journals . Notes for research . Drama and Role Play – Hot Seating/ . Timetables Freeze Frame/ Thought Tracking/ . Annotated maps Conscience Alley . Notes of advice . Dance . Narrative fiction . Visual Approaches - Visualisation/ . Letters Illustration/ Story Mapping . Writing in Role . Shared Writing Links to other texts: . The Star of Kazan and The Dragonfly Pool, both by Eva Ibbotson. Two further adventure stories from the author of Journey to the River Sea. Anthony Horowitz’s Stormbreaker would provide an good comparative text, which has many similarities in terms of its plot of a young person thrown into a new world by circumstances outside their control. The two narratives are similarly character driven (while Journey to the River Sea has a strong female protagonist, Stormbreaker has a strong male lead), and both are gripping adventure stories. For a comparison text with an equally strong female protagonist, Dead Man’s Cove and Kidnap in the Caribbean, both by Lauren St John, are strong adventure stories, in a contemporary setting. The story of Little Lord Fauntleroy, by Frances Hodgeson Burnett (1886) is mentioned in the text, and you could investigate this text further for its thematic links to Journey to the River Sea. Resources . A wide range of information books about the Amazon and the Brazilian rainforest for your children’s research, and for a themed display in your book corner. Teaching Sessions ©The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education. You may use this teaching sequence freely in your school but it cannot be commercially published or reproduced or used for anything other than educational purposes without the express permission of CLPE. Sessions 1 &2: Research The aim of the first two sessions is to ascertain what your children already know about the Amazon and Brazil and what they would like to find out, in advance of reading any of the text. Discuss with your children what they already know about the Amazon and the Brazilian rainforest. Ask your children, in pairs, to note down what they already know, and some of the things they would like to find out, and, following this, create a master list on a flipchart or IWB. From the list of things the children have indicated they would like to find out, model turning these ideas into research questions, for example, Which species of animals that live along the Amazon are endangered? . Ask your children to work in pairs to formulate their own research question based on the ideas you have gathered as a class, and to prepare a short visual presentation. Model for your children a range of options for presenting their research to the group, in order to increase the knowledge of the whole class about the setting. Session 3: Reading aloud, ‘Tell Me’ – Booktalk, Role on the Wall . Read aloud page 1 to ‘Moreover, they took in children whose parents were abroad and needed somewhere to spend the holidays’. Use the basic ‘Tell Me’ questions to discuss the opening of the novel. For the special questions, focus on the setting and the time in which the story is set – When do you think the story is set? What evidence for this is there in the text? . Read the rest of Chapter One aloud. Ask your children to discuss in pairs what they have discovered so far about the characters, in particular the character of Maia. Create a class role on the wall for the character of Maia, using a single colour to add information gleamed from the text so far about her appearance, her likes and dislikes, and aspects of her character. Re-read the section ‘Those who think of the Amazon as a Green Hell bring only their own fears and prejudices to this amazing land. For whether a place is a hell or a heaven rests in yourself, and those who go with courage and an open mind may find themselves in Paradise.’ . Discuss as a class what this statement means. Ask the children whether they think this statement is an accurate one, and how different characters might experience the same place in entirely different ways. Start a class glossary of unfamiliar words that can be added to as the story progresses (you will need to encourage the children to pick out these unfamiliar words as you continue through the story). Session 4-5: Reading Journals, Reading Aloud, Drama and Role Play – Hot Seating, Shared Writing ©The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education. You may use this teaching sequence freely in your school but it cannot be commercially published or reproduced or used for anything other than educational purposes without the express permission of CLPE. Read Chapter Two aloud. Following the reading, add to the role on the wall for Maia with any new information we gain about her from the journey to Brazil. Ask the children to consider what questions they would ask Maia as she disembarked the boat at Manaus.