Lesson video

Hello, welcome to lesson four of "Animal Farm".

Hopefully, you have now got a good understanding of who George Orwell is as well as what an allegory is.

So moving forward, we are going to start to bring everything together and we will look at the plot of "Animal Farm".

I'm going to give you an overview of the plot in today's lesson, before we move on in lesson five, to starting to read the actual story.

So please make sure you have somewhere quiet or somewhere you can concentrate, grab everything you need, so, pen, paper, et cetera, and then when you're ready we can get started.

Excellent, so you should now have everything you need, that includes something to write with and something to write on.

If you still don't have that, or you haven't found a quiet space to work, feel free to pause the video and then press play when you've got everything you need.

But if you are ready, then let's get started.

So on this screen you can see the journey that we'll take together in today's lesson.

So we'll begin with a recap of what an allegory is, before we move on to a plot overview of "Animal Farm".

Now, that means that I will talk you through the plot of the story, everything that happens we will briefly talk about in this lesson.

And that will just prepare us for beginning to read the story together in lesson five.

After the plot overview, we will introduce some new vocabulary before moving on to thinking about when "Animal Farm" was published and why Orwell had so much trouble getting it published.

And then we will finish with the quiz as always for you to reflect on what you have learned today.

So, first of all, as you can see, we have an initial question.

What is an allegory? So, there are four options, option 1: An allegory is a story, poem, or picture with a hidden meaning.

Option 2: An allegory is a story about animals.

Option 3: An allegory is a story written by George Orwell.

And option 4: An allegory is a story about Russia.

Please pause the video here, read them carefully for yourselves, and then select the correct option before pressing Play to find out if you are right.

Good luck.

How did you do with that one? Hopefully, most of you if not all of you managed to choose option 1: An allegory is a story, poem, or picture with a hidden meaning.

So if you did select that one, massive well done, you should be really pleased with yourselves.

If you didn't get that right today, what I'm going to do is just run through the possible answers you might have chosen to make sure we understand why they're not right.

So option 2: An allegory is a story about animals.

Now, I realised that the story we're reading is about animals but not all allegories are.

So often they will include that but it doesn't mean that an allegory has to include animals.

Option 3: An allegory is a story written by George Orwell.

Again, this allegory that we are reading is indeed written by George Orwell, but he also wrote lots of other things that were not allegories.

And finally: An allegory is a story about Russia.

This one is in fact about Russia, well remembered, but not all allegories are, they do not have to be about a particular place or a particular person, it is simply a story, poem, or picture with a hidden meaning that we get to discover as we read it or look at it.

So moving on, I've chosen to include this quote for us to begin thinking about the plot of "Animal Farm", and the quote is: "All animals are created equal, but some are more equal than others." This quote is very, very useful in summarising or encapsulating, so putting everything together what the meaning of this story is, what the intention of "Animal Farm" is.

And it's all about a group of animals who should be equal and who believe they are being treated equally.

But actually the people in charge, or rather the animals in charge are taking lots and lots of power.

And that means that they are seen as "better" or having more opportunities, more power, more money, et cetera, than the ordinary animals who are not leaders.

So this is a really good way for us to think about how the story represents the Russian Revolution and Orwell's intentions of making us understand that there might be some places who say there is equality, but actually there can never be true equality when we have leaders.

So let's have a look at the plot all together.

Now, to start off with, we meet Mr. Jones of Manor Farm.

Mr. Jones of Manor farm is the farmer who owns the farm.

However, he is very, very lazy and he drinks a lot of alcohol.

So what that means is that one day he completely forgets to feed the animals.

Now, on this day that he forgets to feed the animals a rebellion takes place and the pigs on the farm lead the rebellion.

Napoleon and Snowball, they're going to be two very important characters that we talk about.

So Napoleon and Snowball, they promise to the pigs to stop the inequality that takes place on the farm.

So they say, "We've had a rebellion, we've got rid of Mr. Jones and the men, and now we're going to have a farm that is equal for everyone." And the third bullet point there tells us that Manor Farm is renamed to Animal Farm.

Next, the animals are in charge.

They have complete control of the farm, the pigs being the leaders, Napoleon and snowball.

And the pigs come up with some rules that the other animals must follow.

So this is when we begin to see that perhaps things aren't as equal as we might think they were, because Snowball and Napoleon, they give the other animal some rules to follow.

As time passes and we continue reading through the story the pigs start to abuse their power, and the animals on the farm end up being treated even worse than they were originally by the farmer, Mr. James.

So we can see how it starts off with the farmer, with humans in charge, the animals have a rebellion, the pigs take charge and promise equality and a better life.

But by the time we get to the end of the story, actually, the pigs do not uphold that promise.

And there are lots of events, which we're going to look at together over the next few lessons to show how the pigs abuse their power and how it ends up that the animals become treated even more badly than they were originally.

So, you've now had an overview of the plot, a very quick overview, however, hopefully that will be enough for you to have a go at this true or false activity.

There are five bullet points on the screen.

I would like you to read through each bullet point and then write down whether they are true or false.

So you can pause the video here and read through them on the screen, note down on your piece of paper, exercise books, whatever you are using, whether they are true or false.

And then when you're finished press Play for us to do some feedback together.

So press Pause when you're ready and then press Play to get some feedback.

Good luck.

Okay, how did you do? Let's find out.

Number one: Farmer Jones forgets to feed the animals.

Did you put that as true or false? So all of you who chose that as true are 100% correct, well done.

So I've written that in green on the screen.

So you can see that it is indeed true, farmer Jones forgets to feed the animals.

Bullet point number two: Two horses on the farm lead the rebellion against farmer Jones.

Did you put this one as true or false? Hopefully, false.

So it's kind of confusing in this one because there is a rebellion against farmer Jones, yes, but it's not two horses that lead it but two pigs.

So it's two pigs that lead the rebellion.

Now, if you wanted to get bonus points and you're really, really brave and you had a go, you might have even written the names of the pigs which would have been Napoleon and Snowball.

So if you did include those as well, give yourself an extra couple of ticks.

Number three: Animal Farm is the new name given to Manor Farm.

Easy peasy, definitely true.

The title of the story we are reading kind of gives that away as well.

So Animal Farm is the new name given to Manor Farm.

Bullet point number four: All of the animals come up with some new rules to follow.

Again, this one is a little bit tricky.

It is false.

Although there are new rules to follow on the farm all of the animals do not come up with these rules, instead it is only the pigs.

So the animals do not all have an opportunity to share their opinion they are just told about the new rules by the pigs.

So that means bullet four was false.

And then finally we have bullet five: The pigs abused their power.

Yes, 100% true.

So we haven't read the whole story together yet, but we do know from the plot overview that over time, as time goes on the pigs become more and more powerful and interested in keeping their power.

So what that means is that they start to treat the other animals badly to make sure that they keep their power.

So the pigs do abuse their power.

If you got five out of five, give yourself a big clap, a pat on the back, a smile, whatever you like, massive well done.

If there are a few that you didn't quite get right it might be worth you rewinding the video and just watching that plot overview again, you could even make some notes on the plot overview in your notepads, exercise books if that will help you to remember.

But if not, let's move on.

So here is a piece of new vocabulary for you.

And the new vocabulary is oppression.

I'll say that once more for you, oppression.

And I'd like you to shout it back at me please.

So the new vocabulary is oppression.

Not quite loud enough, try again, oppression.

Excellent, well done.

So oppression is when a person or group of people use power in an unfair or cruel way.

So oppression is all about one person, or it can be a group using the power that they already have to stop other people from being happy, from doing what they want to do, from gaining power.

But all of it is about being unfair or just simply being cruel.

So if you have a look at the three examples on the screen, number one: An example of oppression is having no freedom of speech.

So if you have no freedom of speech and you're not allowed to say or share your opinion you are oppressed because you are being stopped from doing something, that's unfair.

Number two: Martin Luther King hoped to stop the oppression of black Americans.

So, black Americans before the 1960s were segregated.

Some of you may already know this, but I'll just quickly go over it for you.

So what that means is that black people in America were not able to share the same toilets, or the same public transport, or drinking fountains with white people.

So black Americans were being oppressed.

They were being stopped from doing things.

They were being treated unfairly and cruelly, and Martin Luther King hoped to stop the oppression of these black Americans.

And then number three: Women have often been oppressed in society.

So, throughout history women in many places around the world have often been treated unfairly by not being allowed to vote or not being given the same pay as their male counterparts and this is oppression.

Women have been oppressed because they have been treated unfairly.

So your new vocabulary for today is oppression.

And you can probably already see and already figure out why we've learned that word when you think about what "Animal Farm" is all about.

So, let's have a look at publishing "Animal Farm".

So, a writer will write their story, or write their book, their article, et cetera.

And then they have to send it off to a publisher, and the publisher will be the people who decide whether the piece of writing goes for sale and whether it's available for lots of people.

So anyone can be a writer and they can write in their house, et cetera.

But until it is published they don't get money for it.

So publishing a story or a piece of writing means that it's widely accessible, that people can access it and buy it.

So it's really important for writers to publish their work.

Now, "'Animal Farm' was banned in Russia when it was written and it's still banned in North Korea today.

People are scared of the power of Orwell's work.

He was a brave and powerful writer who was desperate to warn the world of the dangers of evil leaders." Now, with that information we can understand why publishing "Animal Farm" was so difficult.

Orwell was writing "Animal Farm" to criticise what was happening around the world.

So a lot of publishers didn't really want to upset people.

So they weren't very keen on publishing this work, which was criticising a lot of leaders in Europe at the time.

And that's why "Animal Farm" was banned in Russia when it was written.

Because as we know, the story is an allegory for the Russian Revolution.

So I don't think the leaders in Russia would have been very pleased with having that story around.

And today in North Korea, North Korea is a communist country, meaning that they have a very similar system to how Russia was after the Russian Revolution.

And so we can understand why "Animal Farm" is not allowed in North Korea today.

It's still banned there.

So as the piece of writing on the screen says, "People were scared of Orwell, he was a very powerful writer and he wanted to warn the world of the dangers of evil leaders." And that's why he found it very difficult to publish his work.

What I'd like you to do now is based on what we've just spoken about, I have rewritten what was on the screen, but I've left blank spaces for you to complete.

So you can pause the video here and write down the same paragraph that you can see on the screen, but I would like you to fill in those blank spaces based on what we have just spoken about.

So press Pause to pause the video and copy down what's on the screen, filling in the spaces, and then press Play when you are ready for some feedback.

Excellent, how did you do? Let's go through the answers quickly.

So I will read out the entire paragraph, and when I get to the work that you need to complete, I'll just raise my voice a little bit louder and emphasise the word.

"'Animal Farm' was banned in Russia when it was written and is still banned in North Korea today.

People are scared of the power of Orwell's work.

He was a brave and powerful writer who was desperate to warn the world of the dangers of evil leaders.

So hopefully you managed to get at least most of them correct.

If you need to pause the video here to fill those in, that's absolutely fine, but if you've got them all right and you're comfortable with all of that information, then let's move on.

So here is our final activity for this lesson.

We are going to be answering the question: Why did George Orwell use an allegory to write "Animal Farm"? There are three sentences on the screen and each sentence has got words taken out.

So as you are listening to me, I want you to be filling in the gaps.

So I will be telling you what the words in the gaps are, so listen very carefully and then you can press Pause and try and fill as many in as you can before pressing Play and getting some feedback.

So, number one: The characters and events of the novel represent the characters and events of the Russian Revolution.

Number two: Orwell wrote animal farm because he wanted to tell the true story of the Russian Revolution in a way that anyone could understand, and the effect that the revolution had on ordinary people.

So number two is talking all about how Orwell wanted to get ordinary people to relate to what was happening in Russia and to encourage people to understand and sympathise with the people in Russia.

And finally, number three: However, "Animal Farm" is not only an allegory of the Russian revolution it is also a broader comment on political power in general and totalitarianism.

So we spoke about totalitarian systems last lesson, and totalitarianism is when a country has one ruler or one group of people who make all of the decisions.

They have total power, totalitarianism.

And "Animal Farm", like I said, is a broader comment about political power in general and the effect of totalitarianism.

So if you have trouble spelling that final word try your very best and don't worry because it will appear on the next slide.

So press Pause if you need to write down any of those things that fill in the gaps and then press Play when you are ready for feedback.

Excellent, so here we have the three answers.

So the gap fill for number one is Russian Revolution.

The gap fill for number two is that: Orwell wanted to tell the true story of the revolution in a way anyone could understand and the effect it had on real people.

You might have put ordinary people so if your answer isn't exactly what's on the screen don't worry as long as you've got the general idea.

And number three: However, "Animal Farm" is not only an allegory of the Russian Revolution, it is also a broader comment on political power and totalitarianism.

So as promised there's that long word for you to spell if you need to double-check how you spell it.

So that is lesson four complete.

Massive well done for all of the work you've done today, and I'm sure you'll be very pleased to know that in lesson five, we are actually going to start exploring and reading the story together.

So your brain is now full of loads of information that you need to know and we can really begin to discover the story of "Animal Farm" together, using all of that background knowledge that we have now.

If you would like to, you can ask your parent or carer if they would like to share any of your work on social media.

And if they would, we have a Twitter handle @OakNational as well as #LearnwithOak.

And we always love to see the work that you guys are doing.

So that is an option if your parent or carer would like to do so.

As for us, relax and get ready for lesson five whenever you are ready to learn more about "Animal Farm".