Lesson video

Hello everyone.

My name's Ms. Butt, and today I'm going to teach you some new vocabulary for you to use in your unit on Oliver Twist.

Now, one of the most famous scenes in Oliver Twist is when he brazenly asks for more food.

The food that they've been given is not very much, and it's also not very tasty.

So today we're going to be learning some ways to describe the food that Oliver eats.

I hope you enjoy the lesson.

Here's what we're going to do in today's lesson.

First, I'm going to introduce the words one at a time, and we're going to look at an illustration for each word to help us understand what they mean.

Then we're going to look at word pairs and synonyms for each word.

And again, this will give us a deeper understanding of how we can use these words effectively.

And finally, we're going to apply these words in sentences, and we're going to be focusing on sentences that you can directly take and use in your writing on Oliver Twist.

For this learning you're going to need an exercise book or a piece of paper to write on, something to write with, like a pencil and your brains.

Can you pause the video to make sure you've got everything you need and that you're ready for your learning.

Here's some key vocabulary we're going to be using today.

I'm going to say each word and then I'd like you to repeat it back to me.

Synonym, word pair, adjective, noun.

Well done.

So let's go through what these mean.

A synonym is a word that means exactly, or nearly the same as another word.

Like merry and happy.

They mean the same thing.

Word pairs are words that often appear together.

Like if you took the word, bright, it might often appear with the word bright sun, bright moon or bright light.

So those words would be their word pairs.

An adjective is a describing word.

And today we're going to be learning three describing words to describe the food that Oliver and his friends are given to eat by Mr. Bumble.

And a noun, is a person, a place, or a thing.

So for example, Mr. Bumble would be a noun or the hole would be a place and the gruel they eat would be a thing.

Let's start thinking about meals.

Now, obviously they weren't very lucky in the work house where Oliver worked and they were given the same thing every day.

If you had to eat the same meal every day for the rest of your life, what would it be? I'm sure it wouldn't be gruel like they ate or something, blat, something boring like porridge.

I wonder if you can pause the video and have a little think about what you would choose.

Great, well done.

I put a picture of pizza here because I love pizza.

And I feel like if I ate it every day, I would never get bored of it.

So let's take a look at our first word we could use to describe a meal.

Before I show you the word, I'm going to, first of all, get you to look closely at an illustration.

What's happening in this picture? This picture has been drawn, especially to represent what this word means.

So can you look closely at this picture and see what story it's telling? How would you describe this meal? How is the character feeling, do you think? Can you either just have a think about it, or you can say aloud and describe it, describe what you see.

Okay, so this character that doesn't look very happy.

Not only can I see that this character is propped up, so it looks like they've perhaps hurt themselves, but they also have got patches sewn up onto their hat and onto their clothes, which makes me think that these might be quite old clothes they're wearing.

That this character is holding a tray, and on that tray there is one bean.

I hope this isn't all this character has got to eat because that looks like a very small portion of food.

And it doesn't look like it's going to be enough to fill this character up.

This character looks to me like they need a big hearty meal.

That's find out what this word is.

Meagre.

Meagre.

Meagre is an adjective.

And it means small, limited, or not enough.

Like a meal made up of a single bean.

Can you imagine if tonight for dinner, whoever cooked you dinner made you just one single bean? That would not be a very substantial meal.

So I'm going to read you some words now, and as I read them, I'd like you to see if you can spot the synonyms of meagre.

Remember, a synonym is a word that means the same thing.

If the word isn't a synonym, that means it's a word pair.

Portion, lunch, diet, not enough, resources, wage, limited, possessions, rations, and small.

Let me just go over some of those words for you.

A wage is what you get paid and rations are fixed amounts of something that you're allowed.

Quite often, you have rations when it's a time of shortage.

So for example, in the war, when there wasn't as much food as they normally was, there would be rations, so that people would get the certain amount of say, potatoes or milk each week so that people didn't take too much.

They could share the resources they had.

Here's the word meagre in a sentence so that you can see it in the context.

Oliver packed up his meagre possessions before being thrown out onto the frosty streets.

Can you pause the video now and see if you can spot the three synonyms of meagre.

Okay, let's see how you got on.

The synonyms are not enough, limited and small.

If there was a limited number of something, there's only a certain amount, you can't just keep getting more.

That means that the rest of these words are word pairs.

And I'm going to read them to you now.

Meagre portion, like in that picture, one bean is definitely a meagre portion.

A meagre lunch, meagre diet, meagre resources.

So if you had meagre resources in your school, perhaps you might not have lots of things like colouring pencils and glue sticks.

A meagre wage, and that's what you get paid, so you wouldn't want to have a meagre wage.

Meagre rations and meagre possessions.

Possessions are things that you possess, so the things that belong to you.

Now when we learn new words, it's really important that we don't just hear them being read to us or that we read them, but that we actually say them out loud, because that's the way they stick in our memories.

So I'd like you now, to pause the video and read these word pairs out loud, just like I did.

And as you do, picture what you're reading so that you can really imagine what a meagre ration might look like or meagre possessions.

Off you go.

Great, well done.

So before we move on to our second word, I'd like you to just remind me, what does this word meagre mean? Having a look at the picture to help you, what does it mean? That's right, it means small, limited, or not enough.

Let's take a look at our second illustration.

What's happening in this picture? How do you think this character is feeling about what they're eating? What are they doing to their food? And why do you think they might be doing that? Pause the video and have a think now.

Okay, well, this character looks to be pretty bored from that facial expression.

They've got some salt, but instead of just sprinkling a little bit on, they've just tipped the salt upside down and the salt is going all over what they're eating.

And what they're eating, looks to me, a bit like a piece of wood.

I hope it's not that, cause you definitely can't eat wood.

I wonder why this character is adding so much salt to their food? It makes me wonder if it's because their food doesn't taste of much.

Let's find out.

Ah, this word is bland.

Bland.

So bland is an adjective and it means plain or flavourless like food that is tasteless.

Now I thought this would be a really useful word when you're writing about the gruel Oliver eats, because it looks to me like, or in my imagination, when I read the book or when I watch the film, it looks to me like the gruel does look very bland, very tasteless.

Perhaps Oliver would like to have added some sugar or some salt, something to add flavour, but probably he wasn't allowed to.

Bland can also be used to describe people.

What kind of personality do you think a bland person might have? If we know that it means plain or flavourless or tasteless with food, what would a bland person be like? Do you think? Yeah, I agree.

Maybe quite a plain person.

Perhaps someone who's just quite normal or uninteresting or unemotional.

So perhaps they don't show you much emotions.

A bit like in this picture of this character, they've got quite a bland expression.

Let's take a look now at some words, that could be synonyms or word pairs of bland.

As I read these words to you, can you see if you can identify the three synonyms of bland? Plain, flavourless, food, diet, taste, expression, smile, boring, statement and flavour.

Here's the words in a sentence to help you.

Oliver looked down at the bland gruel in front of him and dreamed of eating a roast chicken.

I bet that's how you would feel if you were eating bland gruel.

Can you pause the video and see if you can tell me the three synonyms of bland? Well done.

So the synonyms are plain, flavourless and boring.

The word flavourless has got the suffix less at the end.

If something is flavour less, it means it has no flavour.

That means the rest of these words are word pairs, which I'm going to read to you now.

Bland food, a bland diet.

If you had a bland diet, perhaps you might only eat things like rice, potatoes and bread with nothing on it.

A bland taste, a bland expression.

Can you all show me a bland expression? Very good.

A bland smile.

This is tricky because you think of a smile was very emotional and interesting, but how could we do a bland smile? Can you try and do one for me? Well done, maybe that's barely like.

And a bland statement, that's something that you, that you would say, statement.

It's not a question or it's not something that's like really expressive.

It's just a statement.

Like if you said what your name was or how old you are.

And a bland flavour.

Now, just like before, because I read the words I want you now to pause the video and read the words yourself.

Cause that's the way that you're going to remember this word bland.

Well done.

So can you remind me, look at the image to help you, What does bland mean? Well done.

It means plain or flavourless.

Let's take a look at our final image.

Oh my goodness, what is happening in this picture? What can you see? What do you think this character is feeling? Why do you think they're feeling that way? And how would you describe that food? Pause the video and have a think.

Okay.

Well, this character looks to me to be feeling extremely unwell.

In fact, it's making me feel unwell, looking at him.

He's clutching his stomach.

He's looks like he's got green eyes.

His tongue's hanging out.

And that looks like the reason he's feeling that way is because this kicked up sandwich he's being handed by the waiter looks like it's got a whole fish in it, some bones, some grey food, that maybe is like mouldy food.

And I can see from the top that it's got some wafts coming off it.

So it makes me feel like it's really smelly.

It looks not like something you'd want to eat.

And in fact, the bread, the top you can see is blue, which means it's gone all mouldy and rotten.

Let's find out what this word is.

Nauseating.

Nauseating.

This is an adjective and it means sickening or disgusting, like a rotten sandwich.

That makes sense when I look at that picture.

So nauseating actually comes from the root wood, nau, which means in Latin or Greek, it means a boat.

So you can see where this word nauseating has come from.

Because the first three letters used to be the Latin, which is an ancient language for a boat.

And I don't know if any of you've been on a boat before, but when people go on boats it can make them feel very sick because of the waves and the motion of the water.

So we can see that this word has got a similar meaning because when you're on a boat, you can feel sick.

And this word means sickening.

Let's take a look at the words that could be synonyms of nauseating.

Food, stench, opinions, sickening, fear, smell, disgusting, stomach turning and sight.

Here's the word in a sentence.

The nauseating stench of gruel wafted down the hall towards the starving boys.

Now I don't think that the gruel would have a particularly strong smell.

But some smells, if you smell them over and over and over again, can make you feel a bit sick because you're sort of, well, you're sick of the smell of it.

And that's why perhaps this stench, the smell of this gruel might make the boys feel a little bit sick.

So can you pause the video and see if you can work out the three synonyms of nauseating? Well done, so the synonyms are sickening, disgusting, and stomach turning.

That means the rest of the words are word pairs, which I'll read to you now.

Nauseating food, nauseating stench, that's a smell, nauseating opinions.

Oh, I think Mr. Bumble would probably have nauseating opinions, opinions that made you feel sick.

Nauseating fear, nauseating smell, and a nauseating sight.

So even sometimes the sight of something can make you feel sick.

And this is a tricky word to say, let's just practise it one more time.

Nauseating.

Well done.

Can you please now, read these word pairs out loud? Off you go.

Okay, well done.

So, and now can you remind me, what does this word mean? Have a look at the image to help you.

Well done, it means sickening or disgusting.

So now we've learned all three words.

I direct you to pause the video and see if you can tell me what each word is that we have learned.

Let's see if you guessed them.

The first one was meagre, the second one was bland, and the third one was nauseating.

Now I'd like you to come up with a definition for each word.

Imagine that you were explaining what these words meant to a younger child, because when we put things in our own words, sometimes that makes it, that's what helps us to remember it.

So pause the video and define each word.

What do they mean? Brilliant, well done.

Really good remembering.

Let's see how you got on.

So meagre, meant small or not enough.

Bland meant plain and flavourless and nauseating meant sickening or disgusting.

Now we're going to try and put these words in sentences.

Let me read this first one to you.

Stomach rumbling, Oliver looked down at his --- portion and decided he was going to ask for more.

Can you pause the video and decide which adjective you think best fits this sentence? So the answer is meagre portion.

He's looking down at his portion and deciding he needs to ask for more because his stomach's churning.

And we know that meagre means that there's not very much of something.

You may notice that the sentence starts with a non finite clause.

That's when you have a verb like rumble, that's a doing word, but you have ING on the end, rumbling.

stomach rumbling comma.

We have a comma at the end of the non finite clause.

And it's a really nice way to start your sentence.

So you could pick any verb.

For example, look, is a verb, it's a doing word.

And then you could turn it into a non finite clause by adding ING, looking around the dining hall, comma Oliver da da da da da, and you can finish your sentence.

Perhaps when you have a go at writing sentences in a minute, you could start the sentence with a non finite clause.

Here's the second sentence.

Now in this sentence, you've got to fit two of the words in.

And so let me read it to you and you can have a think about which words fit.

Oliver did not know what was a more ---- sight - Mr. Bumble or the tasteless, ---- gruel he was serving! Pause the video and see if you can work out the blanks.

So the answers are, Oliver did not know what was a more nauseating sight Mr. Bumble or the tasteless, bland gruel he was serving! There was a bit of a clue there because we saw that the gruel is tasteless and that's a similar to what the word bland means.

So I'd like you now, as your final activity, to write your own sentence, if you want, you could just write one sentence or if you want, you could even try to write a sentence with each word, say three sentences.

That's up to you.

Here are some sentence scaffolds that might help you write your sentences.

So you can see in the first sentence scaffold, can you remember what type of clause that is? Churn is a verb, I've turned it into churning.

Stomach churning comma.

Well done, it's a non finite clause.

So you could start with that, stomach turning comma, and then you could complete the sentence and try and add one of our new words, meagre, bland or nauseating in it.

The second sentence is a complex sentence, starting with the subordinating clause.

As Oliver ---- comma, he ----.

So for example, you could say, as Oliver looks down at his bland gruel comma, he dreamt of a roast chicken.

And finally, in the last sentence we've got an embedded relative clause.

That starts with which or who and adds in extra information.

The smell of gruel comma, which was ----, and then you could talk about either the smell drifted or wafted, and you could talk about where it drifted or wafted.

So you could pick one of those sentence scaffolds, and then you could fill in the blanks and try to make you a sentence as ambitious as possible.

And the really important thing is to try and use one of our new words that we've learned today.

Good luck.

Brilliant.

Well done.

It's always really important when we've written a sentence just to read back and check it for capital letters, full stops, missing punctuation, missing words.

Can you quickly read back the sentence or sentences that you wrote and just check that these look good to you? Well done.

Brilliant.

Well, that brings us to the end of our lesson.

You have now learned three new words to describe the gruel that Oliver and his friends have to eat.

Meagre, bland and nauseating.

You can see that these words though, are not only used to describe food, but can be used to describe many other things.

For example, Oliver has got meagre possessions because he doesn't own very much.

Or you might have a bland expression or you might have a nauseating opinion or a nauseating sight.

So these words have been grouped together because they can describe the foods that Oliver eats.

But they're useful in lots of different contexts.

So I hope they're helpful with your Oliver writing, but I also hope that you can use them in a broader context and impress everyone with your new vocabulary.

Thank you so much for working so hard.

And if you want to share any of your sentences, you can ask the parents or parents take a picture and you can put it on Twitter so that we can all have a look at the brilliant work that you've achieved.

Well done for working so hard.

And I hope I'll see you all soon.

Bye.