Teach-Primary-Issue-19.4

60 | www.teachwire.net Dragon Riders of Roar makes this dream come true for Arthur and Rose Trout. At the start of the book, the twins are about to visit their beloved Land of Roar, a magical world hidden inside a camp bed in their grandad’s attic. Roar is amazing: it has ninja wizards, merwitches, and dragons they can ride! But a surprise visit from their auntie and cousin means their trip is delayed. Rose decides that if she can’t visit Roar she will write about it instead. Scribbling in a notebook, she invents a school hidden in the north of Roar called Dragon Rider Academy, where children are trained to ride ferocious dragons. She designs terrifying lessons, makes herself the star pupil and gives herself an amazing dorm room (with a hot chocolate tap, of course!). She even invents a wicked witch king called Jago Skua. She doesn’t worry about how fierce the dragons are or the terrible things Jago does. After all, it’s just a story. But then Arthur reads Rose’s story, and in the fight that follows the notebook is shoved into the magical camp bed. In a flash every single word that Rose has written bursts into to life – the dragons, the school, even Jago Skua – and Rose and Arthur have to travel to Dragon Rider Academy and enrol at the school Rose has invented... W hen I was 11, I found school a dreary and unfriendly place where I had to spend a lot of time doing things I wasn’t good at, like netball and long division. When I got home, I’d cheer myself up by designing my own school. I drew maps of the classrooms, made up the timetable (there was A LOT of crafting and looking after animals) and I even invented a dorm room for myself with a four-poster bed and a tap that poured out hot chocolate or lemonade, depending on which way you turned it. How I longed to go to my amazing imaginary school. WAGOLL Dragon Riders of Roar , by Jenny McLachlan, ill. Alla Khatkevich (£7.99, Farshore), is out now DOWNLOAD RESOURCES AT Download your FREE , exclusive teaching pack to help you explore both this extract and the rest of the book with your class. tinyurl.com/tp-DRoR FIVE TIPS FOR DESCRIBING AN IMAGINARY PLACE 1. POWER SENTENCES I try to keep my descriptions short, but powerful, by including three pieces of information in one sentence that together paint a vivid and clear picture for the reader. These sentences are like a click of the fingers: just like that, a scene is in the reader’s mind. 2. USE DIALOGUE If characters reveal what they can see through dialogue, you avoid having long descriptive scenes, which can become boring for the reader. It also means you can reveal what a character is like, by their reactions to what they can see. 3. LEAVE THINGS OUT Readers don’t enjoy being bossed around by a writer and told exactly what to think. They want to join in the fun of using their imaginations, so leave some things unsaid. For example, you don’t need an adjective before every noun. 4. SENSIBLE SIMILES If you're writing in the first person, you need to make sure that any figurative language you use (similes, metaphors, personification) could believably come from the lips of your narrator. Arthur is 12, so he’s unlikely to compare golden windows with citrine (an unusual gemstone), but he might say they look like gold pennies. 5. KEEP IT REAL It can be tempting to make everything seem incredible – trees are blue, grass is made out of chocolate! I find adding magical touches to otherwise ordinary things is more effective, though. Peer inside the mind of the author, and help pupils understand how to describe an imaginary place Dragon Riders of Roar, by Jenny McLachlan © Alla Khatkevich