The Highwayman - Unit of Work

The Highwayman - Unit of Work - Teaching Resources

The Highwayman is a unit of work containing a 128-slide PowerPoint, 26 PDF worksheets and 15 lessons. This engaging scheme of work explores the poem verse by verse, analysing its narrative, characters, themes and language through a range of stimulating activities. These teaching resources can be used with either Year 6 (KS2) or Year 7/8 (KS3) depending on the ability of the students.

Our unit for The Highwayman includes planning (planning provided with a 15-lesson unit of work overview), a fully editable PowerPoint teaching resource and 26 accompanying PDF worksheets. The resource can be used to teach a whole class text or as part of a guided reading programme.

Activities contained in the lessons include:

• Engaging verse by verse activities to consolidate understanding as children read through the poem
• Analysis of the characters of The Highwayman, Bess and Tim the ostler
• Exploration of the poem’s key themes
• Developing knowledge and understanding of poetic devices – similes, metaphors, building tension, tone and mood
• Using Point/Evidence/Explain to write about the poem
• Alfred Noyes’s ‘message’ – exploring the author’s purpose
• Cloze and sequencing activities to consolidate understanding
• Analysis of language in detail
• Role play - hot-seating activities to aid understating of characters
• Developing understanding of key characters through empathy writing activities

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