Hello there.

Mr. Barnsley here.

Fantastic to see you today, as we continue to look at myths, legends, and stories that inspire.

Today, we are gonna be looking at some Middle Eastern folktales, and I'm really excited to be reading a short story with you today, "The Jinni and the Fishermen." Now this short story actually appears within another text, "One Thousand and One Nights" by Hanan Al-Shaykh.

So you're gonna need access to this story, "One Thousand and One Nights." It's published by Bloomsbury, 2013 Edition.

You're gonna need access to this to be able to read the story of "The Fishermen and the Jinni" inside.

So do make sure you have access to this text before you start today's lesson.

All right, if you've got it in front of you, then I think it's time for us to begin.

Let's go.

So let's have a look at today's outcome then, shall we? By the end of the day's lesson, you're gonna be able to explain what happens in the story, "The Fishermen and the Jinni." So there are five keywords that I want you to keep an eye out for in today's lesson.

The first is jinni.

So that comes from the title of the story that we're reading.

And a jinni is a supernatural spirit with magical powers.

Folktales is another word we're looking out for, and these are stories that are passed down from generation to generation by word of mouth.

So they're stories that kind of across history were told to each other long, long, long before they were written down.

Now a prophet is a person who is able to communicate the will of God.

A sage is a very wise person.

And then a frame story.

We'll be looking at this idea in a little bit more detail in a bit.

A frame story is a main story, and within that main story, there are shorter stories, okay? So shorter individual stories, but they are held together by a frame story.

Imagine a picture frame around the edge.

It's holding all the other stories together.

All right, they are our five keywords I want you to look out for and potentially use in some of your discussions today.

All right, I think it's time for us to get started.

So we are gonna be looking at the story of "The Fishermen and the Jinni," and today's focus is really about understanding the story.

So I'm gonna break the lesson down into two learning cycles.

We're gonna read the first half of the text together, "The Fishermen and the Jinni," and then in the second half of the lesson, we will read the second half.

I want to break it down because I want to really check that we're understanding before we move on.

I don't want to read it all in one go and then find out that any of us have struggled with elements of the story.

So we're gonna break the story down into two sections.

Okay, as I said at the beginning, you are gonna need your own copy of "One Thousand and One Nights", the Bloomsbury 2013 Edition, because within that story, we will find "The Fishermen and the Jinni." All right, let's get started with part one.

So today, you're gonna be reading the story called "The Fishermen and the Jinni." Now, this is a famous story, and it is taken from a collection of Middle Eastern folktales, and they are called "One Thousand and One Nights." So the premise of "One Thousand and One Nights", the idea, what what's it about? Let's let's think about that.

Let's make sure we understand because "The Fisherman and the Jinni" is just one story within this collection of folktales.

Well, it's about a man called Shashayar, and he's a powerful ruler, and he believes that all women are unfaithful and they're bad.

So he decides to marry as many women as he can, and he kills them each night the night after their marriage.

So he marries a woman, and the night after their wedding, he kills them, and he marries another woman, because he's wanting to punish women because he believes they are unfaithful and they are bad.

So we meet Shashayar when he has just married a person called Shahrazad.

So we met him as he's married, he's got a new wife called Shahrazad.

Now Shahrazad tells stories each night to intrigue Shashayar.

She ends each story on a cliffhanger, so he's really eager to find out what happens next.

I wonder if you're starting to piece together and think, hmm, I can see what Shahrazad's doing here.

In this way, he puts off killing her for 1001 nights.

He's so intrigued to find out how her stories will continue, he lets her live because he wants to find out what's gonna happen next.

And actually, at the end, after 1001 nights, he decides not to kill her at all.

So this, on reflection, looks like a very, very sensible strategy from Shahrazad here to tell these engaging stories to keep Shashayar interested in her long enough to keep her alive.

So that's the premise, that's the overarching idea in "One thousand and One Nights".

So let's just check you've understood that.

I got three sentence stems on the left that all begin Shahrazad tells stories.

However, they all have a different connective at the end: because, but, and so.

And all those connectives are gonna do slightly different jobs.

So you're gonna connect them to the sentence stems on the right to create full sentences that make sense.

So you're really gonna have to look at those connectives, because, but, and so, and think about the job that they are doing in each sentence.

All right, pause the video, over to you to give this a go, and press play when you think you have created three logical sentences.

All right, pause the video, give this a go, and press play when you're done.

Welcome back.

Some fantastic independent thinking there.

Let's have a look to see how you did then.

Shahrazad tells stories because otherwise her husband will kill her.

Shahrazad tells stories, but she always ends on a cliffhanger, so her husband demands to know more the next night.

Shahrazad tells stories, so her husband puts off killing her.

Well done if you've got each of those sentences right and you spotted the job that each of those connectors were doing in those sentences.

Well done.

So "One Thousand and One Nights" uses a frame story.

Remember that keyword.

It's a story that frames some other individual stories within it.

It works to hold all the other smaller stories together.

Now, Shahrazad's marriage, her relationship with Shashayar, and her storytelling is the frame story.

So that's the story that holds all of these shorter stories together.

It's the main story that we keep returning to in the middle and at the end of the shorter stories.

Okay, so we keep coming back to this frame story whilst exploring these shorter stories.

Now, "The Fisherman and the Jinni" is one of the short stories within the frame story.

It's one of the stories that Shahrazad tells to Shashayar to keep him engaged and entertained, and most importantly, to keep her alive.

So over to you to think about if you've ever seen a structure like this before.

Have you ever read any stories that include a frame story? And why might a writer choose to include a frame story? So not Shahrazad, okay? We know why Shahrazad is using these kind of shorter stories, but I want to think about the writer of "One Thousand and One Nights." Why might that be an interesting technique to use, a frame story to hold all of your shorter stories together? Okay, I'm gonna hand this one over to you.

So if you've got a partner, you can discuss this with them.

But don't worry if you're working by yourself, you can just think through these questions independently.

All right, pause the video, give yourself some time to think and discuss, and press play when you are ready to continue.

All right, over to you.

Welcome back.

Some great discussions there.

I wonder if you could think of any other stories that included frame stories that you have already read.

I really want to focus on some of the things that some of you were saying about that second bullet point.

Why might a writer choose to include a frame story? Well, I heard lots of you saying that it actually gives the whole text a focus whilst being able to tell lotsa very different individual stories.

It allows the writer to get really creative with all of these different ideas, but still have them all linked together with this frame story.

And ultimately, it allows us to follow this bigger narrative, this bigger story.

In this case, the narrative of Shahrazad and her marriage to Shashayar while still looking at these very individual mini-stories within the text.

You might have said other things as well during your discussion.

That's fantastic too.

As long as they're logical, they make logical sense, and that we can link them back to kind of the frame story, in this case, Shahrazad and Shashayar's frame story.

And we can think, does this make sense with this frame story? Then I think we can have other things that we might have said as well, and that's fantastic.

All right, let's do another check on the summery to see how we're getting on here.

"The Fishermen and the Jinni" is the frame story of "One Thousand and One Nights." Is that true or false? Pause the video, have a think, and press play when you've got an idea.

Yeah, really well done if you said that was false.

Let's justify that.

Is it that there are multiple frame stories in "One Thousand and One Nights"? Or is it B, the story of Shahrazad and the Shashayar is the frame story of "One Thousand and One Nights"? Is it A or B? Pause the video, have a think, and press play when you've got an idea.

Great work if you said B.

So we know the story of Shahrazad is the frame story.

There can only be one frame story.

We can't have multiple frame stories; otherwise, I think that would become very, very confusing as a structural technique.

So in "One Thousand and One Nights", there is one frame story and then multiple shorter stories, of which "The Fishermen and the Jinni" is one of them.

So we are gonna read the first section of Hanan Al-Shaykh's version of "The Fishermen and the Jinni." This story starts on page 12 of "One Thousand and One Nights." A reminder that you are gonna need access to "The Fishermen and the Jinni" to be able to do this lesson.

So you're gonna start reading the story on page 12, and then you're gonna stop on page 19 when you reach the word "began." After you read, I want you to answer these questions in full sentences to show your understanding of the text so far: Why was the jinni placed inside the jar? Why does the jinni want to kill the fishermen? How does the fisherman evade death? What story is the fisherman about to tell? All right, pause the video.

Over to you.

If you are working in a group and you can read collectively, you could share the reading between you, but I want you to work on the questions independently.

However, don't worry if you're working by yourself; this is an excellent time to practise some of your independent reading skills, and of course, work through these questions to show your understanding of the text so far.

All right, pause the video, over to you to do some reading and some comprehension, and press play when you think you're ready to move on.

Welcome back.

Some fantastic reading going on there.

Well done to those of you who might not have been reading yourself, you might have been listening to others, but you were still following along, keeping your eyes on the text as you were being read to.

That was great to see.

And of course, those of you who read independently, fantastic job.

All right, I asked you to answer four questions.

Let's have a look at some of the things that you might have said to show your understanding of the text so far.

So that first question: Why was the jinni placed inside the jar? I wonder if you said something similar to this: The jinni rebelled against God and then refused to obey the prophet.

The person who was talking about the will of God, Suleiman.

Suleiman punished the jinni by confining him to a jar, which was then cast, thrown, into the sea.

Why does the jinni want to kill the fishermen? Well, the jinni wanted to be released from the jar, and for hundreds of years, he promised various rewards to the person who freed him.

But then he changed his promise.

Instead of rewarding the person who freed him, he said he would kill them in a horrible, vicious way.

So how does the fisherman evade death? How does he escape death? Well, the fisherman tricks the jinni.

He says he doesn't believe he could fit inside the jar.

To prove the fisherman was wrong, the jinni gets into the jar again.

The fisherman closes the lid on the jinni so he cannot escape.

And what story is the fisherman about to tell? And the fisherman is about to tell the jinni a story.

The story is about two characters, a king and a sage, a very, very wise man.

All right, I wonder if you got the same answers or very similar answers to the ones I just shared with you.

I hope you did 'cause that shows me that you've understood what you've read of the text so far.

But don't worry if you didn't.

If there were anything that said, "Oh, that didn't feel quite right to me," go back and look at my summary again.

And also, maybe you want to just reread that section of the text just to double-check your understanding.

All right, if you think you are happy with what we've read so far and you're feeling really confident, then I think it's time for us to move on.

So some excellent reading in the first part of today's lesson.

Now we're gonna focus on the second part, of "The Fishermen and the Jinni." So Shahrazad is telling King Shashayar the story of "The Fishermen and the Jinni." Within the story, there is also another story about a king and his sage.

The fisherman tells the jinni this tale in order to teach him a lesson.

What lesson do you think the fisherman might be trying to teach the jinni? Try and justify your answer.

And do you think the jinni will listen to the fisherman? Again, try and justify your answer.

One thing to help you with your justification is why did he think about what Shahrazad might be trying to teach King Shashayar through telling him the story of "The Fishermen and the Jinni"? So you can see we've got layers of story here.

All right, I'm gonna hand this over to you.

Two questions you can see on the screen.

If you've got a partner, discuss these together.

Share some ideas together.

Or if you're working by yourself, just think through these independently.

All right, pause the video, do some thinking, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

Some great discussions there.

I'm not gonna dwell on this for too long 'cause I really want us to continue with reading, but I did hear a few of you saying maybe the fisherman is teaching the jinni about being a good person and not killing people.

This might be a message that Shahrazad thinks is very important for the king to hear too.

Let's see if we are right then with those predictions.

But before we move on, I want us to just triple-check our understanding of what we've read so far.

So you're gonna match the sentence stems to their endings.

We've got, first, then, next, and finally.

You're gonna match these up to create a summary of what we have read so far.

So pause the video, match these sentence stems, and press play when you think you've got them in the right order.

Over to you.

Welcome back.

Let's see how you did there.

So first, the jinni threatens to kill the fisherman.

Then, the fisherman tricks the jinni.

Next, the jinni promises to reward the fisherman if he releases him.

Finally, the fisherman tells the jinni a story.

Well done if you've got all of those correct.

Okay, I think it's time then to finish our reading.

You are gonna read the second section of Hanan Al-Shaykh's version of "The Fisherman and the Jinni." So we're gonna start on page 19 of "One Thousand and One Nights" with the word "there." We're gonna start where we finished.

And then, you're gonna stop reading on page 24 at the word "began." As you read, I want you to answer these questions in full sentences: Why does King Yunan decide to kill his sage? How does the sage get revenge? What is the effect of the fisherman's story on the jinni? And how does Shahrazad evade death even though the story of "The Fishermen and the Jinni" is finished? All right, let's continue reading or finish reading "The Fisherman and the Jinni", and then there are some questions on the screen that you need to answer to show your understanding.

All right , over to you.

Pause the video, do some reading and comprehension, and press play when you're done.

All right, welcome back.

I always find it really rewarding when we finish a story, even if it's a short story like this.

So some fantastic reading there.

All right, I want to check your comprehension now.

Let's see how we could have answered these questions to show that we really understood the text that we've read.

So why does King Yunan decide to kill his sage? Well, the king's advisor convinces him to kill his sage.

He tells the king to be wary of his sage and that his magical powers are something to fear.

How does the sage get revenge? Well, the sage gets revenge by putting poison on the page of the book that the king is desperate to read.

The king licks his finger so that he can more easily turn each page, and so he ingests the poison, and eventually he dies.

So what's the effect of the fisherman's story on the jinni? Well, the fisherman's story teaches the jinni a lesson.

He no longer wants to kill the fisherman.

Instead, he rewards him by turning all the fish he catches into precious jewels.

And how does Shahrazad evade death then, even though the story of "The Fisherman and the Jinni" is finally finished? Shahrazad says that the story of "The Fisherman and the Jinni" is not as good as another story which she knows.

And King Shashayar is so eager to hear this story that he decides to put off killing Shahrazad for one more night.

Really well done if you got all of those answers correct or you said very similar things, 'cause that shows me you really understood what you are reading.

But again, don't worry if you've got something slightly different and you think, "Actually, that might not have been right." If we ever struggle to summarise a story, summarise the key reading, then that's just a little sign to us that maybe we've not completely understood what we've read and we can always go back and reread before we continue.

Really fantastic work today.

So that's it, we've reached the end of today's lesson.

We've really focused on reading, and you've done some fantastic independent reading and comprehension.

On the screen, you can see a summary of everything we've covered today.

Let's read through this together so you can feel really confident before you move on to your next lesson.

So, "One Thousand and One Nights" is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales.

"One Thousand and One Nights" uses a frame story, a main story which surrounds shorter stories all told by the same character, Shahrazad.

Shahrazad tells these stories to her husband, ending each instalment on a cliffhanger.

In this way, her husband, desperate to know the rest of the story, puts off killing her, his usual custom with his wives.

And "The Fisherman and the Jinni" is one of the stories Shahrazad tells her husband.

All right, great reading today.

It's been a real pleasure reading this story alongside you.

I hope to see you in one of our lessons again in the future.

Have a great day with whatever you choose to do with the rest of your day, and I will see you all soon.

Bye-bye.