Little J is initially scared to approach the ‘monster’ in the back yard. Encouraged to face his fears, he vows to catch the frilly-necked monster and sets about building a monster trap with the help of Levi.

Explore - Share feelings and thoughts about the events and characters in texts

Theme - CHARACTER

Character

As a class, define what ‘character’ is, and what function or role the ‘main character’ and ‘secondary character’ has in the story. Nominate some well-known fantasy or monster stories and ask students which character is the main character and which are the secondary characters. List these characters on a chart against the title of the story.

Have the students find images of these characters to accompany their names. Ask each student to select one or two characters, one main character and/or one secondary character, and have them draw an image for each character on a blank playing card. Have the students write the character’s name on the other side of the card. Each completed card can become one card in a set of playing cards. These cards can be used for ‘association’ games, such as Concentration, Snap, Spelling B, Charades, or Guess Who?

Alternatively, ask students to draw, paint or construct an image or object of the characters associated with their story. Students could develop a scary story using 1–5 characters. Each of the characters could be designed as a paper finger puppet. Sit the students in groups of four and have each student take a turn of sharing their story using their finger puppets. A template for the finger puppets can be found at

• Paper cone finger puppets

Suggested resources

• Memory game maker, (Scootle: TLF ID M009713)
  Students can use this tool to make their own interactive memory game in which a player must find up to six matching pairs of cards arranged in two rows. Students can create text, pictures or sounds on each row of cards. They can customise the look and sound of the game.
• Sentence game maker, (Scootle: TLF-IDM009716)

This resource is a tool students can use to make an interactive sentence game. The game involves sentences that have one or more words missing and a number of possible ‘answer’ words.