Bring one of the UK’s most loved children’s authors into your classroom and inspire pupils to explore how characters change when placed in new worlds.
In this episode of Author In Your Classroom, Dame Jacqueline Wilson (author of The Primrose Railway Children, Tracy Beaker and Hetty Feather) shares how she takes familiar characters and places them in unfamiliar settings to spark new stories. Drawing on her reimagining of E. Nesbit’s The Railway Children, Jacqueline explains how setting shapes character, emotion and plot.
This teaching sequence supports pupils in developing narrative ideas by starting with characters they already know and enjoy. It helps children think more deeply about how characters might react to new environments, encouraging richer description, empathy and storytelling.
Short extracts from the podcast are suggested throughout the unit to introduce each stage of learning. These are optional but highly engaging, helping pupils connect classroom writing with the creative choices of a professional author.
Resource pack contents
This free classroom pack supports a complete fiction-writing unit and includes:
- A ready-to-use PowerPoint
- An extract from The Primrose Railway Children
- Planning sheets for characters, settings and story ideas
- Working wall images and quotes
- Themed writing paper
Teaching overview
Across five sessions, pupils will:
- Explore characters they know: Discuss favourite characters from books and consider how existing characters can inspire new stories.
- Place characters in unfamiliar settings: Investigate how Jacqueline Wilson moves modern children into an Edwardian setting and how this affects their reactions.
- Describe new places: Study how setting is brought to life through sensory detail, expanded noun phrases and dialogue.
- Develop story ideas: Use characters and settings to explore what might happen next, without over-planning the ending.
- Write and edit a story: Write a story for themselves, allowing characters and settings to drive the narrative, with opportunities to edit and improve.
How to listen
Search for Author In Your Classroom wherever you get your podcasts. A free resources pack is available with every episode.
Subscribe to hear more brilliant children’s authors share writing advice that helps pupils write with confidence, imagination and purpose.
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