Hello there.

Fantastic to see you today.

Thank you so much for joining me.

My name is Mr. Barnsley, and I'm really excited as we continue to study within the unit Myths, legends and stories that inspire.

And today, we are gonna be reading and understanding an extract from a new story, "The Song of Achilles." Now you're gonna need a copy of "The Song of Achilles" by Madeline Miller, by Bloomsbury Publishing.

Really, really important you have a copy of this because you're gonna need it.

In today's lesson, we are reading, understanding, and we're gonna be doing some annotating.

Really excited to learn alongside you today.

So I think it's time for us to get started.

Let's go.

Okay, let's look at today's outcome then, shall we? By the end of today's lesson, you're gonna be able to show your understanding of the extract from "The Song of Achilles." And you're gonna do this through comprehension and annotation.

So let's have a look at our five keywords that we're gonna keep an eye out for in today's lesson.

The first is a phrase, it's first person.

And the narrator of a story is a character in the story.

So any thing that's written from the first person will use pronouns like I and me, and we're hearing very specifically from one character.

And perspective, you might have heard me say perspective, that's the point of view.

So we're gonna be looking for the first person perspective, the point of view of one character.

Now you might also look out for the word renowned, and that means famous.

You might look for the word captivate, and that means to hold the attention of someone.

And you might have noticed in our outcome that one of the keywords is annotate, and that means to make short notes on or about a text.

So as we read the text today, we're gonna be doing some annotating.

All right, there are our keywords.

If you need to pause the video and read through the definitions one more time, please do so now.

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

So we're gonna be reading an extract from "The Song of Achilles." And it's really important that we understand this extract.

So we're gonna do this in two key parts.

So firstly, we're gonna spend the first half of the lesson reading and annotating the extract.

And then we're gonna be thinking about what we read.

And we're gonna move on to doing some evaluating the presentation of one of the key characters, Patroclus.

Okay, let's get started with some reading and annotating.

So in Greek mythology, Achilles is the son of King Peleus and Thetis.

And Thetis was a sea nymph, which is like a minor female deity, kind of almost like mythical creature.

Now, Achilles is renowned.

He's famous for being powerful and being a handsome warrior.

There are many, many stories about his bravery, about his speed, but also about his temper.

Now our extract today is from a text called "The Song of Achilles," and this was written by Madeline Miller.

Now, Miller tells the stories of Achilles in the first person, so from the perspective of one of the characters, but not from Achilles, but actually his best friend Patroclus.

So I want you to think then.

What might it feel like to have a best friend like Achilles who is powerful, and handsome, he's brave, he's fast, but also can sometimes have a temper? And then why do you think Miller might have chosen to write from Patroclus's perspective? Alright, I'm gonna hand this over to you now to think about these two bullet points.

If you've got a partner, then I think it'd be fantastic for you to discuss with them.

But don't worry if you're working by yourself.

If that's the case, just think through these questions independently.

Alright, over to you.

Pause the video, think through these questions, and press play when you think you've got some ideas and you're ready to continue.

Alright, welcome back.

Some really fantastic discussions there.

I heard lots of you really going back and forth what it might be like to have a best friend like Achilles.

Lots of you saying, well, great, you know, he seems like he's a really kind of special guy.

Why wouldn't you want to be friends with someone who has all of these positive attributes? I heard some of you saying, actually, that might be, I might feel a little bit insecure if my friend was so powerful, and handsome, and brave, and fast.

But, like, wow, you can do everything.

And he might make me feel a little bit inferior in comparison.

Some of you talked about his temper and saying, well, actually, that's not a great quality, a great attribute to have in a friend.

So I could see that we weren't all in complete agreement with what it might be like to have a friend like Achilles.

What I did hear quite a few of you say is it was quite an interesting for Miller to pick the perspective of Patroclus here because, actually, so many of Achilles' stories are about him or from his perspective.

So this is really interesting, to shift what we might expect a story or the perspective we might expect to see a story of Achilles written from.

So well done if you picked that out.

Okay, let's pause for a moment and quickly check our understanding of the lesson so far.

So I want you to match the sentence stems on the left with the sentence stems on the right.

Now you might have noticed that all the sentence stems on the left look very, very similar.

They all start with Achilles is renowned in Greek mythology.

However, the connective that follows is slightly different, because, but, and so.

All of those connectors do a slightly different job, and they will help you decide which of the sentence stems on the right should go with them.

Alright, so it's over to you now to pause the video, read each of the sentence stems really, really carefully, and see if you can match them together to make full, clear sentences.

Alright, pause the video, give us a go, and press play when you think you've got the right answer.

Welcome back.

Let's have a look at what you said then, shall we? So Achilles is renowned in Greek mythology because of his strength and bravery.

Well done if you've got that right.

Achilles is renowned in Greek mythology, but Miller chose to write her story from the first person perspective of Patroclus.

And Achilles is renowned in Greek mythology, so he's the main character of lots of different stories.

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

So we're about to read and annotate the extract.

Remember, to annotate means to make notes, okay? To make brief notes about the extract.

So how do we annotate? Well, one thing we can do is we can circle any key vocabulary.

So in this extract, we might want to circle any words which describe Achilles.

We can also underline important words and phrases.

So if something kind of helps us learn something about a character, it might not be a specific piece of vocabulary, but actually, together, you know, this word or a group of words as a phrase might help us learn something about a character, so we can underline that.

Now, square brackets is really useful for putting around a full sentence.

So when a full sentence or even group of sentences, we think, is really important, then we can put square brackets around these.

For example, if Patroclus describes how his father feels about him, we might think this is really important.

We want to be able to remember where this came from.

Now, if something really stands out, I think, look, this is one of the key ideas on this page or in this chapter, then I'm gonna put a star next to it to say this is one of the most important things in this whole extract.

So an example of this might be when Patroclus first describes Achilles, okay? We know how important Achilles is, so this might feel like a really important thing that I really want to remember where it came from in the text.

And then I might write a few notes about key inferences and ideas.

So the important thing here is writing down things that aren't explicit on the page, okay? So if I've made, or if we've discussed as a class, you know, an inference, which I'm kind of reading between the lines, and I'm saying, well, this isn't explicit on the page, so if I don't write this down, I might forget this conversation that we've had.

That is when I will make a note in maybe in the margin or on the side of the extract.

Alright, why don't you pause that for a moment and reread those things, and make sure you feel really confident with your five steps of annotation.

Pause the video, have a quick reread, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

It's time for our first practise task of today's lesson, and you're gonna be doing some reading.

Now, I said at the beginning of the lesson you're gonna need to have access to "The Song of Achilles." So now it's time to make sure you've got that in front of you.

Okay, you're gonna read the first paragraph of "The Song of Achilles," chapter one, page one.

You can do this independently or you can do this in a small group depending on who you are working with.

Alright, pause the video, read this paragraph, and then press play when you're ready to learn how to annotate.

Alright, over to you.

Welcome back.

Some really great reading there.

Now let's have a look at how Jun annotated this first paragraph.

He's gonna explain his ideas to help model, show to you, how we can annotate a text.

So Jun said that he circled the word bull because it describes Patroclus's father, and it makes it clear that he's someone to be feared.

He underlined the phrase that told us how young Patroclus's mother was.

He thought this was quite important.

We're learning something about the family.

He used square brackets around the sentence which described Patroclus's father.

This was a full sentence of father's status.

It was a full sentence which showed how important Patroclus's father is.

Now, when he'd read the whole paragraph, he went back and thought, you know what, the most important idea in this paragraph is the fact that Patroclus's father is compared to a bull.

And so he put a star there.

And then he wrote some notes about key inferences and ideas that he made.

So he wrote that Miller establishes Patroclus comes from a really important family.

This whole paragraph is about his dad, who seems like a very dominant character.

Alright, that's what Jun annotated in the text.

If you want, you can go back and add some of Jun's annotations, but don't worry if you have slightly different annotations.

Of course this is your own interpretation of what you think is important in the text as you read.

Right, so it's over to you now to continue your reading.

You're gonna continue reading "The Song of Achilles" from the beginning of the novel to the end of paragraph five, which is on page three.

So you're reading the first five paragraphs.

And as you do, I want you to annotate the extract using the prompts as a guide, remembering to circle key vocabulary, underlining important words or phrases, using square brackets around important sentences, stars next to any key ideas, and then writing notes about key inferences and ideas that are not explicit in the text.

So kind of thoughts where you've had to read between the lines.

Okay, over to you.

Pause the video, give this a go, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Some fantastic reading there.

That was really great to see.

Alright, we're gonna take a moment to reflect on the annotations that we've made.

We're gonna do that again.

Jun's gonna share some of his.

You can compare your ideas to his.

And then we'll take a moment just to reflect on the quality of the notes that we made.

So Jun said that he circled the words honey and prince because Patroclus uses both of these to describe Achilles.

He underlined the simile, which describes Achilles when he's running.

He puts square brackets around the sentence when Miller switches to the present tense to describe the competition.

He put a star next to the idea that Patroclus's father is envious of Achilles' father.

He thought this was a really important point.

And he wrote that Patroclus seemed captivated by Achilles.

He singles him out from all the other athletes.

He also wrote that Patroclus is very aware of his father's disappointment in him.

So these are the two main ideas, the two main inference that he made, that Patroclus seemed very captivated by Achilles, but Patroclus is also very aware that his own father was disappointed in him.

So I want you now to pause the video, and if you've got a partner, you can discuss with them.

If you're working by yourself, you can just reflect independently.

But what were some of the most important annotations that you made? Pause the video, take a moment to reflect, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

We've done some excellent reading and annotating the extract.

But to really show we've understood the extract, which is part of the title of today's lesson, we're gonna start thinking about how the character of Patroclus has been presented in this text.

So Jun and Sam, two of our eight pupils, discuss the character of Patroclus.

Jun says you can tell that Patroclus is captivated by Achilles by the way he describes him.

And Sam says, no, I don't think Patroclus is captivated by Achilles.

I think he's envious.

He's jealous of him.

Why don't you pause the video for a moment and think about who do you agree with more and why.

If you've got a partner, you can discuss with them.

Otherwise, you can think through this independently.

Pause the video, have a think, and press play when you come to your own conclusion.

Okay, I heard some really good discussions there.

People not sure whether they agreed with each other.

I heard lots of you challenging each other if you disagreed, and that's great as long as we are doing that really respectfully.

Okay, so Sam wrote up her ideas into a paragraph.

She wrote, arguably, Miller presents Patroclus as envious of Achilles.

More specifically, when Achilles wins the race, it says that Patroclus stares at his father as he gives Achilles the prize.

Patroclus then uses the word slow to refer to himself, which shows he knows exactly what his father thinks of him.

After his father insults him, Patroclus describes his hands as empty as he's no longer holding the golden crown.

Achilles has it.

This suggests Patroclus feels like he has no purpose, whereas Achilles is being celebrated by everyone.

So this is a really nice paragraph by Sam, really showing her understanding of the text, and doing so by explaining her thoughts on the presentation of the character of Patroclus.

But let's see why this is successful.

Well, first of all, she has a really clear topic sentence.

That first sentence outlines exactly what this paragraph is going to be about.

It's all gonna be about Patroclus being envious of Achilles.

She also uses multiple quotations to support her argument.

So the words stares, slow, and empty all support this idea that Patroclus is envious, is jealous of Achilles.

But she also makes some inferences here.

She explains her quotations.

She shows to us that she understands how these words show that Patroclus is envious.

So this is the success criteria we're gonna be working through in the second half of today's lesson.

But which part of the success criteria is missing? So I shared three pieces of success criteria, clear topic sentence, something else, and explained quotations.

What is that missing piece? Pause the video, have a think, and press play when you think you've got the right idea.

Welcome back and well done if you said multiple quotations selected.

We don't just want one quote.

I want you to see you selecting a range of short quotations, one word quotations, from across the text to help prove your topic sentence.

Right, I'm handing over to you now for the second task in today's lesson.

You are gonna show your understanding of the extract by answering this question.

How is Patroclus presented in "The Song of Achilles?" Okay, remember, you're writing one paragraph.

It doesn't have to be longer than one paragraph.

But you are gonna need to refer to the text in your paragraph.

I've given you some sentence starters to guide your response.

Arguably, Miller presents Patroclus as.

That can really help us create that topic sentence.

And then more specifically will help us dive into some of that language analysis.

Now you could, if you would like to, use either Sam or Jun's ideas to get you started.

So you could be more inclined to agree with Jun, who said that Patroclus was really captivated by Achilles, or you could agree with Sam and say, but actually, you think Patroclus was really envious, jealous of Achilles.

Of course you might have a slightly different interpretation, and that's absolutely fine.

You do not have to agree with Jun or Sam.

You can have your own interpretation as well.

Alright, over to you.

Use all the information on the slide to help you.

I know you can do a fantastic job at this.

I know you can write really confidently 'cause you've shown a really, really good understanding of the text so far.

Okay, pause the video, give this a go, and press play when you are ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

Some fantastic writing there.

I was really, really pleased to see so many of you checking your spelling and punctuation and your grammar before you put your pen down.

That's fantastic to see.

Okay, let's remind ourselves of Sam's paragraph from earlier.

And we remember that she used these three steps of a success criteria to make sure her answer was really clear, coherent, and fully explained.

So she used a clear topic sentence, she used multiple quotations, and she explained all of her quotations.

And that's what I want to make sure you have done.

So I want you to take a moment to reflect on your own paragraph, and I want you to identify where you have met this checklist.

So reread your paragraph, look out for your clear topic sentence, identify where you've used multiple quotations, and identify where you've explained those quotations.

Of course, if there's anything in this checklist that you didn't manage to do the first time round, now is the time to improve your work and add them to your paragraph.

Okay, pause the video then, reread your work, and make improvements if you need to.

Alright, over to you.

Right, that's it.

Fantastic work today.

It's been a pleasure learning alongside you.

On the screen, you can see a summary of all the key learning that we have covered in today's lesson.

I would like us to go through this to make sure you feel really confident before you move on to your next lesson.

We've learned that Achilles is a renowned warrior from Greek mythology.

We've also learned that Patroclus is another character from Greek mythology, and he is the closest friend of Achilles.

Madeline Miller wrote "The Song of Achilles" from the first person perspective of Patroclus.

And to start, Miller focuses on the relationship between Patroclus and his father, and when Patroclus first sees Achilles.

And then we learnt, when annotating a text, you can use a range of symbols and notes to help develop an understanding of the text's main ideas.

Alright, fantastic work today.

Thank you so much for joining me.

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

Have a great day.

Bye-bye.