Our main character (nameless), seeks refuge from her disconnected life in the adventures she creates with her red crayon.

If possible find some red paper (or colour a piece of paper red), if you cannot find red any paper, wallpaper, thin card or cereal box will do! The portal is a literary device that is often used to link real and imagined worlds, while the magic pencil enables an illustrator to demonstrate visually their ability to adapt and control an invented space using their own interventions. One approach is to start narrating the story yourself, inviting the children to step in when they want to.meaning my children had many different interpretations of what the action was all about at each of our many perusals. The bird guides the girl as they escape from these guards and soon they find themselves in the forest again except there is a purple door. Taken as a whole, his illustrations provide a rich and memorable reading experience that will inspire much in the way of thinking and talking, and make a wonderful starting point for creative projects of all kinds.

Bring a red rug into school (the sort you can roll up and carry under one arm) and use it for story sharing in small groups with an adult helper (perhaps in secret locations around the school). With just a swipe of chalk and a lot of imagination she travels to far away lands filled with wonder and mystery; beauty and danger. This resource will support you to use the wordless picture book Journey by Aaron Becker as part of a whole school project. The resource has been designed to be used by an entire school to foster a shared learning experience around one text and 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. Next draw out the template (if you ned to), and carefully cut the lines - take care not to cut too close to the edge!Especially because, despite the fact that the journey in this book is by that of a young girl, it still felt very much like a personal journey for the illustrator. Red marker pen in hand, she creates a boat, a balloon and a flying carpet which carry her on a spectacular journey … who knows where? All three of us sat around the dining room table, not reading the wordless pages, yet fully enthralled by this wonderful adventure of a girl escaping loneliness and the doldrums of daily life with a stick of magic chalk. Ideally, if children have their own copy of the book, allow them to read the book independently at their own pace.

Don’t forget to have a launch party with invitations and refreshments, and make sure your exhibits are well-labelled and catalogued. Alternatively look at one of the books by Alan Snow: How Dinosaurs Really Work, How Pirates Really work, How Santa Really Works, or David Macauley’s How Things Work Now. The sessions could be added to with art activities and through further learning in PSHE, Science, Geography and History. There is a scene in the book where the bad guy is seen from a distance, directing his two men to place the captured purple bird in a cage. Alternatively, if you are reading the book at home, you might want to look at it a second time and invite your child to share with you anything they found interesting or puzzling as you look at the pages together.I highly highly recommend you subscribe to get these great teaching ideas for utilising ICT in the curriculum!