Sessions 4 - 5: after viewing

brenda and her father
Brenda and her Dad

session 4: character

Objectives:

to reinforce understanding of the construction of character in the film; or characterisation,
to articulate personal responses to the characters in the film.

Resources:

Project books
Worksheets 1 to 5 – these can be found in the KS2 worksheets at the end of this section.

Input:

Use partner conferencing
Ask the children to tell a partner about two things they enjoyed about the film.
The partner should repeat back and then feed back their partner’s response to the class.
Ask the children for their general responses to the film.
Check their understanding of the narrative of the film and flashback concepts by asking questions.
Ask who the main characters are

Activity: In small groups or as carousel, use the worksheets enlarged to A3 to generate children’s responses to the different characters and to discuss how they are constructed in the film.

Ideas for plenary:

Feedback and discuss their responses.
Work with worksheets 1 to 5 which explain opinion by using evidence from the film.
What do you see?
What do you hear?

session 5: setting

Objectives:

to consider how the setting or location is used to create the scene and contribute to the audience’s understanding of the narrative
to articulate personal responses to the settings used in the film
to reflect on places that they feel safe to escape to, and the qualities that those places have.

Resources:

Project books
The film: The Wrong Flowers’. You will need to view the film again with a group of students. The film can be seen:
- on video in school
- high quality print at a pre-arranged screening at a local cinema.
- online on this site - for this option click here.

Input:

Tell the children that they are going to watch the film again.
Explain that they are going to look out for the number of different settings in which the action of the film takes place.

Show the film:

List the settings as they occur in the film:

outside the playground
in the classroom
in the playground
in the field of flowers
in the school shed
under the tree

Activity:

They should choose one of these settings from the film and describe it to their partner. The description will include:

colours
shapes
objects / natural objects / buildings

Make a rough labeled sketch to help visualise the setting.

Show the film again. The children should compare their sketch with the part of the film in which it is shown.

Ideas for plenary:

Discuss the different settings in turn:

how does each setting help to create a mood for the audience?
what do the settings and what you see in them add to what we know about Brenda and her experience life?
what do these details tell us about her feelings?

extension activities

Art/PSHE

Ask the children to:

describe the places that make them feel safe and the places that are special to them.
draw / photograph / paint one of these places.
label the things about it that make you feel good, and explain why

If you would like to contribute children’s artwork to the online gallery, go to the Over to you! section of this resource for further details.

To see examples of children’s poetry and paintings click here.

History

The first part of the story took place in the 1940’s.
Discuss what the children notice about Brenda’s classroom from the 1940’s which is different from their classroom today. What can they see in there?

Ask the children to discuss what they think the filmmakers have done to the classroom in Ashton Gate School, Bristol, in order to make the classroom look like a 1940’s classroom.