A Writing Root for The Polar Express - Whole School Sequence

Main Outcomes:

A rhyming couplet and a first-person narrative based on an imagined journey to the North Pole to see Santa Claus.

Overview and Outcomes:

This is a one or two-week planning sequence for The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsberg and the film of the same name and The Night Before Christmas by Clement C. Moore. Children are immersed in all things Christmas and winter before climbing aboard The Polar Express. They have several opportunities including role-play; writing Christmas cracker mottos or a verse for a Christmas card; creating labels or tags; making an advert; developing a narrative version of story; writing persuasively and preparing for and holding a debate. 

This resource has been designed to be used by an entire school, phase or class to engender written outcomes – some with the same audiences and purposes, some not – that are ‘at pitch’ for each phase/stage but that will also aid revision, catch-up and extension where (and in whichever form) needed. We have planned for activities at different stages: grouped into key-stages; grouped into Reception with Year 1; Year 2 with Year 3 and then Year 4 to Year 6 or grouped simply into EYFS with KS1 and KS2. Where this is the grouping, there are opportunities for differentiation within to ensure that the pitch of sessions is appropriate. The resource is intended to form the basis upon which schools and teachers can create and shape a sequence that will work well in their context. The sessions could be added to with art activities and through further learning in PSHE, science, geography and history. 

Synopsis of Text:

Late one Christmas Eve, a boy boards a mysterious train that waits for him: the Polar Express bound for the North Pole. When he arrives, Santa offers him any gift he desires. The boy modestly asks for one bell from the reindeer's harness. It turns out to be a very special gift, for only believers in Santa can hear it ring.

Links:

Christmas, narrative poetry, trains