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Writer's pictureJamie Thomas

Day 6 - Harry Potter (creative ideas for teaching English and maths at home)

Harry Potter

Harry Potter is currently all the rage in our house. Finley, our youngest, enjoys nothing more than screaming 'Expelliarmus' with a wand readily poised, and the other two are Potter mad, devouring the books and falling in love with the many characters.


We hope you like the ideas...


 

English

  • poetry

  • figurative language


Activity 1: The Wizard's Pocket

The following activity is taken from the book Jumpstart Literacy by Pie Corbett. These books are an amazing resource for creative games and activities to get children imagining and playing with language. You can find all the books here: https://www.talkforwritingshop.com/shop


The idea is that you come up with a list of things you could find in a wizard's pocket (or an elf's sack / goblin's cave / etc.) The best thing about this activity is that there are no boundaries and nothing can be wrong. The challenge is to help the children to think creatively and to develop their ideas for new, exciting combinations. To help the boys, we began by making a list of categories and brainstorming ideas:

  • magical objects

  • everyday objects

  • clothes

  • books

  • emotions / feelings

  • pictures / photos

  • sounds

  • tastes


We then had a go at writing our own list poems. Here is what we came up with:


The Wizard's Pocket

In a wizard's pocket, I could find...

a wand of wishes, charged with promise,

mythical mayhem, manipulating murderers,

a book of nightmares, tormenting hope,

vials of laughter to illuminate the darkness,

a black widow's bite, a scorpion's sting,

a dementor's last gasp.


© Jamie Thomas 2020

The Wizard's Pocket

In a wizard's pocket, I could find...

a wand made out of x-ray glasses that can spot criminals,

sounds of death shouting silence,

a magic carpet that flips and twirls,

a book of exploding potions,

a map that reveals secrets,

a hippogriff's beak as sharp as nettles.

by Archie


The Wizard's Pocket

In a wizard's pocket, I could find...

a wand made out of lava to shoot out the fiercest spells,

a sword forged from the boiling sun,

a screaming book of creepy spells,

a snake's battle cry,

Dobby's sock, a symbol of freedom,

a troll's skull, bursting with laughter.

by Josh


Activity 2: Quizzes and Quills


Whilst searching for Harry Potter themed ideas, we came across this fun worksheet, free to download on the Mini Boden website.











 

Maths

  • Money

  • Add and subtract amounts of money to give change

  • Use both £ and p in practical contexts

Whilst wanting to make our sessions as practical and engaging as possible, I am also aware that they need lots of practise with their formal written methods. The following activity, sourced from TES, combines their interest in Harry Potter with adding and subtracting decimal numbers with money.


We began the session by making a toolkit for solving problems with money. This is an excellent way to make sure the children use the mathematical tools that are available to them. Here is the toolkit and lesson resource.




 

I hope you have enjoyed today's home-schooling in English and maths. If you have, please do follow our blog (or follow me on Twitter) and tune in tomorrow where the stimulus is my son Archie's choice...


Dinosaurs!

JT

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