Lesson video

Hi there, I'm Mr. Buckingham, and it's so nice to see you here for today's lesson.

Now today is an exciting lesson because we're going to complete our reading of the wonderful book, "A Kind of Spark" by Elle McNicoll, and we'll see how all the different storylines play out at the end of the book.

And we'll see if we can draw out some themes that the book raises.

I can't wait to see how this story ends, so let's get going.

Today's lesson is called Exploring Concepts and Themes in "A Kind of Spark," and it comes from a unit called "A Kind of Spark" Reading.

By the end of today's lesson, we'll be able to consider how the resolution to "A Kind of Spark" links to different concepts, and draw out key themes from the whole book.

Now for this lesson, you will need to have access to the 2020 Knights Of edition of "A Kind of Spark" written by Elle McNicoll and illustrated by Kay Wilson.

And we're going to start reading today from chapter 19.

So if you haven't read up to the end of chapter 18 yet, you might want to pause and do that now before you continue.

If you're ready, let's go to work.

Here are our keywords for today's lesson.

My turn, your turn.

Evidence.

Concept.

And theme.

Well done.

So evidence is the information from a text that can support or justify our reasoning.

And a concept is an abstract idea like hope or fairness.

And a theme is a central idea of the text that the author wants us to think deeply about.

So here's our lesson outline for today.

We're going to start off by exploring some concepts that link to "A Kind of Spark," and then once we've completed the whole book, we'll explore some themes that the book raises as a whole.

So in chapter 17 to 18, which hopefully you've read already, we read the following events.

We saw that Nina apologises to Addie for putting her in the video and they discuss why they've not been as close as Addie and Keedie have been.

And Addie explains that she loves Nina and doesn't need her to be like Keedie, and they share a hug for the first time in a long time.

Keedie has then unfortunately a burnout, meaning a breakdown brought on by being overwhelmed from masking so much at university and by that confrontation with Miss Murphy.

And Keedie encourages Addie to tell her story at the village meeting, to help people understand why the women's story is particularly important to her.

So can you explain what led to Keedie's burnout? And how is it linked to her autism? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Good ideas.

So you could say, at university, Keedie feels a lot of pressure to mask, to hide her autism and to behave in the way she's expected to.

And this effort of constant masking has exhausted her and it's worn her down.

Or maybe you said this.

Keedie's also felt pressure to hide her feelings from Addie to avoid upsetting her, and that can't have helped her.

And she also believes that she's less resilient than Addie, doesn't she? And that's why she describes herself as a leaf.

So she's saying she's a bit more vulnerable to these difficulties than she thinks Addie might be.

Really well done for your thoughts there.

So in this lesson, we're going to start reading from chapter 19.

Let's look at some vocabulary we're going to encounter in this chapter.

Now cud is the word for the partially-digested food that cows bring back up to their mouth to chew some more.

And a confidant is someone who you trust with secrets and tell your secrets to.

Your temple is the side of your head next to your eyes.

And if you're in a trance, you're only semi-conscious.

So you're only partly conscious.

If you're defiant, you're resisting against something.

If you're infuriated, you're very angry and frustrated.

And jibes are mean comments that are meant to hurt your feelings.

So now we've discussed that vocabulary, I'd like you to read up to the word bullies on page 173.

Pause the video and have a read.

Well done.

Good reading.

So how did you feel about the way Addie talked to Jenna when they came across each other in that field? Do you think Addie did the right thing? And why or why not? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Good discussion.

So maybe you agree with Izzy.

She says, Addie was right.

She just explained to Jenna what a real friend would've done in that situation.

She wasn't mean or rude.

She's just said she doesn't care about the opinion of someone who doesn't care about her.

Maybe you agree with Alex.

He said, Jenna didn't even apologise for what she did.

She was just making excuses.

And she hasn't shown at all that she's changed her feelings towards Addie or that she understands what she did wrong.

And that's true, isn't it? Jenna didn't actually say sorry for what she'd done.

She said that it was a bad situation, but she just made excuses about it and didn't apologise.

So Addie was perfectly polite.

She just made her feelings known.

She was quite assertive, wasn't she? She said what she wanted, and she said what she thought Jenna should have done if she was a good friend.

Really well done for ideas there.

Now what evidence is there on pages 168 to 169 that Jenna is uncomfortable with that conversation we've just discussed? Pause the video, look back in the book, and see what evidence you can find.

Well done.

Good ideas.

So first of all, she looks stunned, doesn't she? And she's fidgeting as they're talking, which is a sign of discomfort, isn't it? And she trails off when she's speaking, suggesting she's slightly nervous, and her voice is desperate at one point.

She babbles, meaning talking uncontrollably, when she's trying to explain herself.

And she goes red in the face, doesn't she, showing embarrassment, when Addie explains what she did wrong.

So loads of signs there that Jenna is really uncomfortable being told the truth by Addie in this situation.

So when Addie is being assertive, Jenna finds that difficult to deal with.

Really well done for finding all the evidence.

Now let's look at page 172.

This is where Addie describes Mum and Dad communicating silently with one another.

So when they're doing that, what do you think Mum might have been thinking here? I'd like you to answer in role as her.

Pause the video and see if you can answer in role as Mum for what she's thinking when she's silently communicating to Dad in that moment.

Well done.

Good ideas.

So remember what's just happened is that Addie has explained that Emily said if she was alive at the time, she would've been treated like the witches were.

So maybe Mum would think this.

How could Emily say that to Addie? What an awful thing to say to another human being, to compare them to a witch! And this explains why Addie feels so strongly about the memorial.

She feels like she and Keedie might have been attacked in the same way if they'd been around in those times.

And you know what, maybe she's right.

Maybe that's exactly what would have happened.

I can't believe my wonderful daughters could have been treated that way.

So maybe this is helping Mum to make connections between Addie's campaign for the memorial and the way she's been treated by Miss Murphy and by Emily in the present day.

So I've tried to show that in what Mum said there.

Really well done for your ideas too.

Good job.

Now I'd like you to read the rest of chapter 19.

Pause the video and have a go.

Well done.

Good reading.

So how would you describe the family at the end of this chapter? Pause the video and have a chat to the person next to you or have a think on your end.

Well done.

Really good thinking.

So maybe you agree with Andeep.

He says, they're united together to support Addie.

And they give her space to be alone by the tree with her thoughts, but then they come over to be with her.

So they're not just emotionally united.

They're literally all together with her in that moment.

Here's what Sofia said.

I think Mum and Dad finally understand why she's been so interested in the witches, and that being at the tree where they were hanged is important to her.

So Sofia's saying that she thinks that Mum and Dad now understand that connection that Addie sees between the way she and Keedie and also Bonnie have been treated and with how the witches were treated in the past.

And so the emotional connection that Addie has to the tree is now really clear to Mum and Dad.

So let's look now at page 174.

Addie describes here making herself smaller.

What does she mean by that? Pause the video and have a think.

Great ideas.

Well done.

So maybe you're thinking this.

She's talking about the way she constantly has to think about whether her autism is impacting on other people, whether she's doing something that is upsetting or annoying to them, and that's what masking is.

So she's saying, when I have to mask, that makes me smaller.

It diminishes you in the same way she referred to right at the start of the book.

Or maybe you agree with Jacob.

He says this.

Exactly, she's hiding herself away in order to make other people more comfortable.

She can't just be herself around people.

I think we all do this sometimes, but it's harder if you're autistic.

So Jacob's saying that she's hiding bits of herself, making herself smaller, in order to make other people feel more comfortable.

Really well done if you had some similar ideas.

Good job.

So how would you describe what Addie is doing and thinking as she stands at the tree? How does she feel as well at the end of the chapter? What conclusions does she reach? Pause the video and see if you can work out what's she's thinking about, what's she doing, and how does she feel at the end of this chapter, and what decisions does she reach? Pause the video and have a careful think.

Well done.

Good thinking.

So Jun says this.

Addie is thinking about the way she's been treated and the way she changes her behaviour to suit other people, like we just discussed.

And she realises that she does this too much and other people actually don't make the same effort to help her out.

So she comes to the conclusion that she doesn't need to change herself and this makes her feel free.

So she's understood that she might be different, but that's okay, and she doesn't need to pretend to be someone else.

So she's almost reaching this conclusion that all her efforts to try and fit in were not useful to her, they weren't helping her, and it's better for her to just be free by being herself instead of worrying about fitting into what other people want so much.

Really well done if you had some similar ideas.

So let's do our first task in this lesson.

Now although this isn't the end of the book, it's a very important moment for Addie when she has this realisation at the tree that we've just discussed.

Now when we read texts, we can try and link what we read to different concepts.

And concepts are just abstract ideas like hope and happiness.

So let's take each of the concepts below and I want you to see if you can explain how it links to the book so far.

Here they are.

Justice is a concept.

It means fairness.

We've got the concept of individuality, and that's the idea of people having things that make them different from each other, that make them unique.

And then we have the concept of freedom, the idea of not being constrained or held back by others.

So can you take those three concepts and talk to your partner or to your class about how they link to the book so far? How did justice, individuality, and freedom relate to "A Kind of Spark"? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Fantastic job.

So here's how you might have linked those concepts to the book.

We know that Addie is seeking, looking for, justice for the women who were executed because she sees that they've been mistreated.

And at the same time, she's realising that she hasn't been treated with justice herself, by Miss Murphy and also by Jenna and Emily.

So she's fighting for justice at the same time as she's been on the receiving end of injustice, unfairness from other people.

What about individuality? Well, Addie's realising, and she's just made this clear at the tree, that her individuality, which she's been trying to push down to make other people happy, is not a bad thing.

And she's seeing that it's okay to be different from other people, to be an individual.

And finally, for freedom, Addie's realising that she'll feel more freedom if she chooses not to worry so much about how others see her and to do her own thing.

So we've linked each of those concepts to things that have happened in the story and to ideas that Addie has had about herself.

Really, really well done for your ideas there.

Good work.

So in the final part of our lesson, we're going to read the rest of the book and see how all of this turns out and then we'll explore some themes that have been raised by the book as a whole.

So we're going to now read chapter 20.

Let's look at some vocabulary we're going to see.

We'll see the word expectant.

If you're expectant, you have a feeling something is about to happen or you know that something is going to happen.

So an expectant mother is someone who's going to have a baby soon, for instance.

Merely means only or just.

For instance, he merely smiled, he only smiled.

A murmur is a low background noise.

Maybe what you might hear in the dinner hall at lunchtime.

A smattering is a small amount of something.

And if you deliberate over something, you are thinking about it carefully.

Now that word is spelled exactly the same as deliberate.

He did it deliberately.

But this is deliberate, which means thinking over something carefully.

And if you're marvelling at something, you are filled with wonder and astonishment about it.

So don't need to read the whole of chapter 20 now.

Just read up to the end of page 181.

Pause the video and have a read.

Well done.

Good reading.

So Addie's now made her speech, hasn't she? What do you think has made that speech persuasive? And which points that she made really stood out to you as being really persuasive ones? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Good job.

So Alex says, I think she showed people how the treatment of the witches was personal for her.

So particularly by mentioning the way Bonnie has been treated in the present day.

And this really helps people to understand.

So she used that story of Bonnie in a really persuasive way, didn't she, to highlight how this situation is in some ways still ongoing to the present day.

Here's what Izzy said.

She also did a good job of showing that she isn't apologetic or ashamed of being autistic, that it can be difficult, but it's just a difference.

And she explained that differences are good things.

And that was a great way of getting the audience on side, showing that she's not ashamed, that she's not feeling bad about being autistic.

She is proud of it and she's happy with that difference.

So now let's look in more detail at pages 178 to 181.

We see here that the crowd is kind of getting on board, getting on side with Addie's speech.

So what evidence can we find that supports the idea, that supports the idea the crowd is enjoying, is engaged with Addie's speech? Pause the video and see how many pieces of evidence you can find in those pages.

Well done.

Good job.

There's loads of evidence, isn't there? For instance, Addie's aware that she has their attention.

And then she's not interrupted by Mr. Macintosh, like she was previously when she spoke.

She feels like the crowd is listening carefully to her.

And she notices Mr. Macintosh look down when she explains that the women were killed for being different.

So it's almost like he's a bit ashamed of what he's been doing up to this point when he realises that connection.

And at one point, the crowd laughs along with her when she makes a joke.

And when Addie finishes, there's a small bit of applause, but then this grows and grows into loud clapping to show that people are really on board with what she's been saying.

Really well done if you found lots of evidence there.

Now I'd like you to read the rest of chapter 20.

Pause the video and have a go.

Well done.

Good job.

So in this section, Addie receives a gift from Audrey.

Why do you think Addie is so delighted with Audrey's gift? Pause the video and have a chat to the person next to you or a think on your own.

Well done.

Good thinking.

So maybe it's for this reason.

We've got here Lucas saying, it shows her that Audrey has taken the time to know her and that she understands how important words, and also being Scottish, are to Addie, because it's a Scots author, isn't it, with some Scots words in there as well.

Well, maybe, you said this.

Here's what Sam said.

Yes, I think it shows her what real friendship is like.

It's not about giving gifts in itself, but about knowing the person really well and thinking about what matters to them.

So Audrey's gift is a really thoughtful one, isn't it? And I think Addie can see that it's kind of evidence of how closely Audrey is paying attention to Addie and how much she is engaged in Addie's life.

It's not really about whether she gets a present or not, but what that present indicates to Addie about her friendship with Audrey.

Really well done for your thoughts there too.

Now we also find in that section that Audrey now says that she really likes sharks just like Addie does.

So do you agree with Jacob? He says, the fact Audrey now likes sharks shows us that the author thinks friendship is based on liking the same things as each other.

Do you agree with Jacob or not? Pause the video and decide and explain why.

Well done.

Good job.

So here's what Sofia said.

She says, I think it's a bit more complicated than that.

I think what makes Addie excited is not so much that Audrey likes sharks, but that Audrey took the time to go away and explore something that she cares about.

Remember, we don't have to like everything our friends like, but we should be open to learning about the things they love.

And this maybe shows Addie the big difference between Audrey and Jenna.

Jenna never wanted to have any interest in things that Addie liked, but here, Audrey has gone away, looked into something Addie loves, sharks, and come back and said, oh, you know what? I really do like that.

And I think that's showing Addie the huge contrast between Jenna and Audrey as friends.

Really well done for your ideas.

So now we're going to read the final chapter of the book.

So pause the video and read chapter 21.

Well done.

You've got to the end of the book! So what are your first thoughts about this ending? Pause the video and have a chat to the person next to you.

Well done.

Maybe you had some ideas like this.

Laura said, I'm glad that the plaque was made, but more than anything, I'm glad that Addie has a good friend in Audrey and that she's happier now in the village.

And here's what Jun said.

I was annoyed that Addie didn't get any credit at all, even though it was her idea.

All Miriam Jensen did was pay for it, which isn't anywhere near as hard.

So he saw in Mr. Macintosh's speech, it almost felt like he was about to say that Addie was the one responsible for it and then he said that it was Miriam Jensen.

So Jun's a little bit annoyed about that, and maybe you were too, but Addie didn't seem to mind too much.

So Mr. Macintosh now seems very keen on this plaque, doesn't he? So why do you think he changed his mind and how does he feel about this plaque now? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Good job.

So Aisha says, I think he was persuaded by Addie's speech.

Some people are very set in their ways, but they're not bad people.

They just need things explained to them in a way that helps them to understand.

So Aisha's saying that Addie's speech was what helped Mr. Macintosh to understand that it still matters what we say about things that happened in the past, even if they're in the past, because that might impact on people who live in the present day.

Maybe you said something like this.

Here's Andeep's view.

He said, I think he likes the idea of the village being special in any way possible.

So having the plaque makes the village good because other villages probably haven't done similar things.

So it's another way of standing out.

So Andeep's being a bit less generous towards Mr. Macintosh here.

He's saying, well, it's just a way for Mr. Macintosh to make the village stand out compared to other villages and make it seem like it's more moral or more good than other villages because it's made this memorial to what it did in the past.

So I'd wonder who you agreed with.

So now that we've read the whole book, we can start to identify some key themes within it.

And themes are central ideas in a text.

So here are two I think we can identify in "A Kind of Spark" and I'm going to give you the evidence that I think supports them.

I think one of the themes is, it's better to be good than to be nice.

For instance, Addie's village has always been nice.

It's a nice place to live, but now it's good as well, because it's thought hard about what it did in the past and made some changes by having this memorial.

So now it's not just nice.

It's nice and good, and that's better.

Another theme is, it's important to be true to yourself.

So Addie and Keedie are both struggling with the idea of having to mask their autism, and Addie's realised that it's more important to be herself.

So that links into this theme I've identified of it being important to be true to yourself.

So which of the below do you think are themes in "A Kind of Spark"? Pause the video and decide.

Well done.

Good job.

Do you think A is one, people never change? No, I don't think so, because we do see some change, for instance, in Mr. Macintosh.

B says, it's important to listen to other people's experiences.

Yes, because maybe that's what this teaches us is that when we can connect with other people's experiences, as we saw Addie do in her speech, that's what helps us to understand them a bit better.

C says what happened in the past isn't important in the present.

That's definitely not right, is it? The book's always said the opposite of that.

And D says, trying too hard to fit in can be a negative thing.

Yeah, I think that is a theme, because that links to this idea of masking being a difficult thing to do and making you less free in Addie's case.

Really well done for identifying those themes.

So now it's your turn.

I want you to think about the book as a whole, and I want you to see if you can identify another theme which you think is really important in the book.

So perhaps it's a lesson you think the book teaches us, or perhaps it's something you realised when you were reading it.

And remember, themes are often ideas about how we should behave or what we could do better, but they could also be negative things.

So I want you to give some evidence as well, like I just did, to support the theme you've identified in the book.

What tells us that this is a key idea in the book? So pause the video and see if you can identify a theme you've noticed in the book as a whole and back that up with some evidence.

Have a go.

Well done.

Fantastic job.

Here's an example of a theme you might have thought of.

Jun says, I think one important theme is, you can make a difference.

Evidence for this is that Addie is told no lots of times when she tries to get a memorial built for the women who were wrongly convicted and killed.

However, she perseveres because she can see how it's still relevant to the present day.

And even though the events happened a long time ago, she can see it links to things that happen today, so she keeps going.

And eventually, she's able to convince the village to buy the plaque.

So Jun's saying all of that proves the book is trying to say that you can make a difference in the world or in your local community.

Here's another example of a theme.

Izzy said, I think one of the main themes is the idea that true friends accept us for who we are.

That doesn't mean they never say we're doing something wrong, but they don't try and change us to be more like them and they accept we might be different to them.

Evidence for this is in Addie and Audrey's friendship.

They aren't identical, but they accept each other and enjoy each other's company and they're able to be their complete, true selves around each other.

They're not having to pretend.

So we're saying that true friends accept us for who we are is a theme that's raised by the book.

I'm sure you identified some brilliant themes as well.

Really good job.

So let's summarise our learning in this lesson.

We learned that as we read a text, we connect what we read to our own experiences and to different concepts that can seem relevant.

And we can also identify broader themes within a text, big ideas that the author might be trying to highlight to us.

And themes and concepts within a text might not be obvious.

We might need to look for evidence for them.

And we often can't be sure what the author was trying to make us think about.

And that's okay.

We can interpret the text in our own way.

So those themes we identified might not have been ones that Elle McNicoll was trying to make us think about, but we've interpreted her story in our own way and seen those themes for ourselves, and that's fine.

Really well done for your effort in this lesson and in this whole unit.

I hope you've really enjoyed reading this book with me.

Great job.

And I hope to see you again in a future lesson.

Goodbye.