Lesson video

Hi there, I'm Mr. Buckingham, and I'm so glad you've decided to join me for today's lesson.

Today, we're going to continue reading the fantastic story of Beowulf, and we'll find out what happens once he enters the court of the Danish king, Hrothgar.

I think you're going to really enjoy reading this section, so let's begin.

Today's lesson is called "Beowulf Among the Danes", and it comes from our unit called "Beowulf Reading".

By the end of today's session, you will have outlined the key events in the third chapter of "Beowulf, and you will have gathered evidence from the text to support an idea.

For this lesson, you will need to have access to the 2013 Oxford Children's Classics edition of "Beowulf", written by Kevin Crossley-Holland and illustrated by Charles Keeping.

If you've got that with you, let's begin.

Here are our keywords for today's lesson.

A prediction is an educated guess based on evidence in the text or prior knowledge.

If you're in role, that's when you take on the perspective of a character in a text.

Impressions are initial feelings about a person, place, or a thing gained from reading a text, and evidence is information or facts to show something is true.

Here's our lesson outline for today.

We're going to start off by reading and exploring Chapter 3 in "Beowulf", and then we'll focus on finding evidence within that chapter to support some different ideas.

Now, we know that the version of "Beowulf" we're reading is based on the original epic poem, which was written in around 1000 CE by an unknown author in the language we call Old English, and so far, we've seen the following events occur in the story.

The Wanderer arrived at the hall of King Hygelac of Geatland and told of the monster, Grendel, who had been terrorising the Danes for 12 years.

The strongest man in the hall, the King's nephew, Beowulf, volunteered to go to Denmark to fight Grendel, taking 14 warriors with him, and the Geat warriors sailed across the sea to Denmark, where a coastguard challenged them, and he questioned Beowulf's ability to defeat Grendel.

But the coastguard then let them go on towards King Hrothgar's famous feasting-hall, Heorot, and they left their weapons outside and entered the hall.

So, that's where we've got to so far in the story.

We're going to read on the next chapter, Chapter 3, today.

So, can you correct the incorrect statements about the plot of "Beowulf" so far? Pause the video and have a go.

Well done, great job.

So, A says, "King Hygelac forced Beowulf to go to Denmark." That's not true, Beowulf happily volunteered to go, didn't he? B says, "Grendel only kills women and children." No, that's incorrect, he kills men too, including 30 thanes in one night all those 12 years ago, and those thanes are people who are given land by the king, but who have to fight for the king in return.

C says, "Heorot has always been an unpleasant place to go." Now, that's not true, before Grendel came along, Heorot was a place of joy and celebration all the time.

We are going to see that it's still a joyful place during the day or during the evening, but when it comes to night, everyone has to leave because they're at risk from Grendel if they stay there.

And D says, "Beowulf and his warriors travelled for days on foot to Denmark." That's not true, they travelled for a day and a night in a sailboat because it's not a huge distance between Sweden, where Geatland is, and Denmark, where the Danish king, Hrothgar, has his court.

Very well done for your ideas there.

So, what's your prediction for what will happen next in the story, and what's your reason for making this prediction? Remember, a prediction isn't just a guess, it's an educated guess based on what we've read before and what we know about similar stories perhaps.

What's your prediction for what's about to happen next as Beowulf and his men enter Heorot and meet King Hrothgar? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done, good thinking.

Here's what Sam says, "I think that King Hrothgar is going to welcome the Geats warmly because that's what he did to Beowulf's father in the past and he sounds like a good ruler.

I think Beowulf is going to defeat Grendel, but it might not be as easy as he thinks.

We know that no-one has been able to do it before, and we haven't been told that Beowulf has any kind of magic powers or special abilities.

He's just strong." So, can you see how Sam's prediction is based on information about the characters? So, she knows that Hrothgar cheated Beowulf's father well, so she's predicting that he'll treat Beowulf well.

She knows that Beowulf hasn't been said to have any special abilities, so she's worried that he might be more at risk from Grendel than he thinks.

Really well done for your predictions as well.

Let's see if they come true.

Now, in Chapter 3, starting on page 10, Beowulf enters the hall of King Hrothgar, and he's going to offer to defeat Grendel.

He's going to say to King Hrothgar, "I'm here to defeat Grendel for you." How might the Danes react to this offer? Why might they not all be positive about the offer? Pause the video and have a chat to the person next to you.

Well done, good thinking.

So, Aisha says this, "The Danes have been fighting Grendel for 12 years and no-one has managed to defeat him." So, "When Beowulf says he's going to be able to defeat him, they might just laugh," mightn't they? "They don't know Beowulf at all and they have no reason to believe that he will be able to do anything that they haven't already tried!" They haven't heard of this person before probably.

They probably know very little about him, so they're just going on their experience, which is that no one can defeat Grendel.

So, they might not be as positive as Beowulf might hope.

Let's see if we're correct.

So, let's prepare to read the first part of Chapter 3, and here's some vocabulary we might encounter.

A gamut is a wide range.

Garnet and amber are jewels, and if you're ensconced, you're buried comfortably, so you might be ensconced in a blanket on the sofa.

Combat is fighting, and a coat-of-mail is a coat of chain mail to protect the body.

If you're reckless, you don't care about the consequences.

A corslet is a piece of armour covering the torso, the main part of your body.

A cask is a container for alcohol, so you might have a cask of mead.

A draught is a large gulp of liquid, so he took a draught of mead from his drinking horn perhaps.

Fate is the idea of events being outside our control.

So, I'd like you to now have a go at reading up to the word "sing" at the top of page 12.

Pause the video and have a go.

Well done, good job.

Here are some of the events you've just read about.

Can you put them in order from one to four? Pause the video and have a go.

Well done, great job.

So, first of all, hopefully you spotted number one is when the hall fell silent as the Geats entered.

Then, Beowulf introduced himself to Hrothgar, who remembered his father and welcomed him.

Then, Beowulf explained his mission and he said he would fight Grendel without weapons.

And then, finally, Hrothgar arranged for the Geats to have a great feast and to be served with lots of ale.

So, as Sam predicted, they were given a warm welcome by King Hrothgar in Heorot.

Now can you answer each of these questions based on Chapter 3? And, of course, you can refer to pages 10 and 11 if you wish.

Pause the video and have a go.

Well done, good job.

So, A says, "How many men does Beowulf say he is as strong as?" He says 30 men, so he's claiming to be incredibly strong, isn't he? B says, "What items of armour is Beowulf going to remove to fight Grendel? Well, he's going to remove his coat-of-mail and his corslet, that chain mail piece of armour covering his torso.

And how many people were in the hall at this point? Well, it was at least a hundred.

Really well done for your answers there.

So, Beowulf has said he's going to remove his armour when he fights Grendel and not use a weapon at all.

Why do you think Beowulf wants to fight Grendel weaponless like this, and what did he mean by saying he wouldn't use a "yellow" shield? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done, good thinking.

So, first of all, why does he want to fight Grendel weaponless? Well, Lucas says this, "He has heard that Grendel has no weapons and he wants things to be "equal".

I think he feels that it has to be a fair fight and he's so confident that he thinks he can beat Grendel without any help at all." So, he's really into this idea, isn't he, of it being an equal match between them, between Grendel and Beowulf, so he's saying, "Well, if Grendel has no armour, if Grendel has no weapons, then neither should I.

I want to beat him on his own terms. I want to beat him as an equal." So, why does he say he wouldn't use a "yellow" shield? Well, Jacob says this, "The colour yellow is often linked to being cowardly.

I think he's saying that using a shield is cowardly and that he wants to be completely unprotected." So, you might have heard of the term of yellow-bellied, meaning cowardly, so he's saying, "This shield, if I used a shield, I would be being a coward, and I want to defeat him as an equal." Really well done for your thoughts there.

So, now let's prepare to read the rest of Chapter 3, so here's some vocabulary we might see.

If you're boisterous, you're noisy and energetic.

If you're burly, you're large and strong.

Whitebait is a type of small fish, very tiny.

Poppycock is nonsense, great word there.

The ale-thane is the man responsible for making sure everyone has enough ale.

They have a special person in the hall, going round maybe, filling people's drinking horns up with more ale.

An item which is adorned is bejewelled or decorated.

Ladies-in-waiting are servants of a queen or a royal woman, and if you're flanked by something, it's on either side of you.

So, if you're flanked by pillars, you'd have pillars on either side of you.

A bolster is a thick, long pillow.

So, can you now read the rest of Chapter 3, which is up to the end of page 14? Pause the video and have a go.

Well done, great job.

So, based on what you just read, which of the statements below are true, and can you correct any untrue statements? Pause the video and have a try.

Well done, good job.

So, A says, "Unferth did not believe Beowulf could defeat Grendel." That is true.

B says, "Beowulf and Unferth had a swimming contest in the past." That's not true, is it? Beowulf and Breca had a swimming contest, and that's what they're arguing about, what the swimming contest was really like.

C says, "At the end of the night, the Geats all left Heorot." That's not right, it's the Danes that left, and the Geats stayed because we know that this place is very dangerous because Grendel will come here at night.

D says, "The Danish queen said that Beowulf had brought hope to her people." That is true, she did say that.

Really well done there, good job.

So, we mentioned there that Unferth and Beowulf are arguing about this swimming contest between Beowulf and Breca, so how are Beowulf and Unferth's versions of that swimming contest story different, and who do you think is telling the truth? So, what was Unferth's version, what was Beowulf's version, and who do you think is telling the truth? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done, good job.

So, Unferth said this, he said that Beowulf gave up the contest after a week and that Breca won, whereas Beowulf says that he and Breca swam next to each other for five days, and then he was dragged to the seabed by a monster, which he then fought and killed.

Now, we can't be sure of the truth because the author doesn't actually say, but Unferth is very drunk, and Beowulf's warriors obviously believe his story.

So, you might want to favour Beowulf in this situation, but we can't be sure because we're not told the complete truth.

Really well done for working out those two different sides.

Good job.

So, let's do our first task for assessment, and we're going to do some role play.

We're going to act in role.

This is where we take on a character's role based on what we've read in the text.

So, I want you to take on the roles of Unferth and Queen Wealhtheow at the end of the night, so after the events that we've just read.

I want you to take some time, first of all, to read back over pages 12 to 14, finding out which of these characters, or Unferth and Queen Wealhtheow, think of Beowulf and his mission.

Then I want you to discuss with a partner what each character might say about him, and finally, say aloud your thoughts in role as each one.

What do you think of Beowulf, and do you feel hopeful that he will succeed, and what do you think will happen to him, to Beowulf? So, speaking, first of all, in role as Unferth, and then in role as Queen Wealhtheow, see if you can say aloud, in role, what they might be thinking about Beowulf.

Pause the video and have a go at working through those steps towards speaking in role.

Well done, great job.

Here are some examples of what you might have said in role.

First of all, as Unferth, "Why on earth does Beowulf think he can succeed where so many of us Danes have failed? What makes him so special? He couldn't even beat Breca in a swimming race! I dare say I won't ever see his face again, he'll be Grendel-food by morning." And here's what Queen Wealhtheow might have said, "For the first time in years, I feel some hope again! Maybe Beowulf is the one who can finally end this terrible sadness for our people.

He says he's willing to die for us, but oh, how I hope it doesn't come to that." So, hopefully, Queen Wealhtheow doesn't want Beowulf to die, but she also is hoping that he will be the one who can finally defeat Grendel.

Really well done for acting so well in role there based on the information that you've read in the text.

Great work.

So, now we've explored Chapter 3.

Let's see if we can work on finding evidence within the text to support certain points.

Now, we know that authors help us to build impressions of characters and events by giving us lots of clues and hints.

Here's an example.

We learned that Beowulf is as strong as 30 men, or he claims to be.

We learned that he volunteers for this mission first of all in the story, and we know that Beowulf swam for days on end with Breca in that swimming contest.

Those are three clues and hints the author has dropped.

What impressions did they give us? They gave us the impression that Beowulf is an impressive, heroic character.

So, we can do this in reverse by looking for evidence in the text to support an idea we already have about a character or an event or a place.

So, if we were looking for evidence that Beowulf is impressive and heroic, then these are three pieces of evidence we could find to support that idea.

So, on page 10, we're given the impression that Heorot is a beautiful, pleasant place, at least until night falls, so what evidence supports the idea that Heorot is beautiful and pleasant? Well, there's lots.

We're told that the tables are "candlelit", suggesting a warm, cosy atmosphere.

We're told that the light of the candles is "golden" and that there are jewels set into the tables.

We're told that there's the scent of herbs in the air and that everyone is speaking harmoniously together.

So, when we read that passage about Heorot, we might not have even noticed how the author gave us the impression that Heorot is beautiful and pleasant, but here we've got the evidence to show how it was done.

The author dropped all of his hints, creating the impression of how beautiful and pleasant Heorot is.

So, here I'd like you to try and match the impressions on the left to the evidence that supports them on the right.

For instance, what is the evidence that Unferth is drunk from the text? Pause the video and see if you can match the impressions to the evidence.

Well done, good job.

So, what evidence supports the impression that Unferth is drunk? Well, he struggled to say that word "poppycock", didn't he? What evidence supports the idea that Beowulf's warriors dislike Unferth? Well, they growl at him.

And what evidence supports the impression that Wealhtheow has a striking appearance? Well, the evidence is that her eyes are "violet" and her clothes are "purple", so two striking colours chosen there to give us the impression that she has a striking appearance.

Really well done for matching those.

So, now let's look at page 11.

What evidence supports the impression that Hrothgar is worried about Beowulf's plan? On this page, Beowulf is telling Hrothgar his plan, and we get the impression from this page that Hrothgar is worried about it, but what evidence supports that impression? What evidence tells us that Hrothgar is worried about this plan? Pause the video, look at page 11, and see what you can find.

Well done, great job.

So, there are quite a few pieces of evidence.

First of all, when Beowulf starts to suggest that he will fight Grendel without weapons, Hrothgar's face is full of "pain", which suggests he knows what Beowulf is about to say and he's worried for him.

His face is full of pain because he's worried that Beowulf could get killed if he fights Grendel with no weapons.

When Beowulf says he won't use a sword, Hrothgar "objected", so he says that's a bad idea.

And then, he begins to try and explain his concerns to Beowulf again before Beowulf interrupts him, so he's trying to explain to Beowulf why this is a bad idea.

So, several times, we see Hrothgar trying to persuade Beowulf that it's a bad idea to fight Grendel weaponless and unprotected, so we've got loads of evidence to support this idea that Hrothgar is worried about Beowulf's plan.

So, let's do our final task for assessment.

We're going to practise finding evidence to support our impressions of different characters.

First of all, I'd like you to scan through Chapter 3 quickly once more so that you're very familiar with the text.

When you do that, you'll notice we're left with two key character impressions after this chapter.

One is that Beowulf is very confident, and the second one is that Unferth is quite rude.

So, I want you to then find all the evidence in Chapter 3 that supports these impressions of Beowulf and Unferth.

What is the evidence that Beowulf is confident, and what is the evidence that Unferth is rude? Pause the video, scan through Chapter 3, and then have a careful look for evidence to support those two impressions.

Pause the video and have a go.

Well done, fantastic job.

So, here's some of the evidence that supports the idea that Beowulf is confident.

First of all, he strides straight up to Hrothgar to introduce himself and immediately asks whether Heorot is "unsafe" at night.

Then he tells everyone that he's as strong as 30 men and that he can defeat Grendel all by himself.

He interrupts the Danish king several times in conversation, which, to a king, is showing greater confidence, isn't it? And he says he will fight Grendel without armour.

He tells his warriors that they should leave Grendel to him, and all the other warriors believe they will die, whereas Beowulf does not, so he's much more confident than even people who know his strength and who know him very well.

So, all of that gives us the impression that Beowulf is very confident, so we've got loads of evidence to support that impression.

Here's some of the evidence to support the impression that Unferth is rude.

He "glared" at Beowulf.

He "leered" as he spoke.

That's a rude way of using your mouth.

He "sneered" at Beowulf and spoke "unpleasantly" towards him.

He mocks Beowulf's claim to have fought whales, suggesting they really were small fish; "whitebait" he describes them as; and he "jeered" at Beowulf as he mocked the idea that he was a hero.

And finally, he "spat" onto the floor after Beowulf spoke.

So, we've got loads of evidence there to support our impression that Unferth was rude in this chapter.

Really well done for the evidence that you found.

Let's summarise our learning in this lesson.

Beowulf arrives in Denmark at the court of King Hrothgar and he explains his plan to defeat Grendel with his bare hands.

After he's confronted by Unferth, the Danes leave Heorot and the Geats go to sleep.

We know when we read, we're constantly forming impressions of characters, places, and things, and these impressions are based on information and hints given by the author, and these can be used as evidence to support our impressions.

We are given the impression that Beowulf is very confident in his abilities, and there is lots of evidence to support this idea.

Really well done for your effort today.

I hope you've enjoyed reading some more of Beowulf with me.

In the next lesson, things are going to get much more dramatic when we see what happens when Beowulf and Grendel finally meet.

I'd love to see you there.

Goodbye.