One Thousand and One Arabian Nights

Take your class back in time with this 1001 Arabian Nights KS2 Planning Pack based on traditional folk tales from the Islamic Golden Age!

At the start of this series of seven lessons, children will be introduced to King Shahryar, who ever since he was betrayed by his first wife has wed a new Queen every evening only to execute her the next morning. We also meet his newest Queen, the quick-witted Shahrazad, a talented story-teller who entertains the King with nightly stories to keep herself alive. Unfortunately, Shahrazad is running out of stories. Can your class keep her from the chopping block by writing an exciting adventure story for her to tell the King? During the unit, your children will explore the structure, settings and characters of the Arabian Nights stories. Through modelled reading, discussion, drama and well-structured, differentiated resources, children will themselves become confident story tellers. In the final part of the unit, your Year 5 class will plan, draft and edit an exciting and engaging adventure story to delight King Shahryar.

You may also like our Early Islamic Civilisation Topic Bundle containing four ready-to-teach schemes of work covering History, Geography, Art and DT. 

Please be aware that, for copyright purposes, we are unable to provide the full text of One Thousand and One Arabian Nights by Geraldine McCaughrean for this scheme of work.

Introducing the story

In this first lesson, your children will be transported back in time to ancient Arabia as you read the prologue of 1001 Arabian Nights: The Marriage of Shahrazad.

By the end of the lesson, children will have a good understanding of the story setting and plot as well as the key characters involved and the relationships between them.

This Year 5 Lesson Pack contains everything you need to introduce the story of 'One Thousand and One Arabian Nights' to your class including: a detailed lesson plan, engaging slideshow and printable, differentiated worksheets.

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Adventure story structure

In this vocabulary-rich lesson, you will enjoy a shared read of Sinbad’s story - Shahrazad’s first tale to King Shahryar. Here, children will be introduced to the terms ‘protagonist’ and ‘antagonist’ and come to know that an adventure story typically involves a conflict between these two characters.

Children will demonstrate their understanding by sequencing and summarising Sinbad’s story before considering the emotional impact of each plot point upon the King.

This story-telling Year 5 Lesson Pack is ready to teach, with a detailed lesson plan, engaging slides for input and differentiated activities.

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Developing characters

Now your children are familiar with the structure of an adventure story, they are ready to start planning a story of their own. This lesson explores the importance of creating a well-rounded central character for the reader to connect with and root for.

Here, children will explore tools that help them convey their character's personality, appearance and their motivation. Your children will create character profiles for their protagonist, or alternatively, get them up and active with a game of twenty questions.

This Year 5 Lesson Pack contains everything you need to develop a well-rounded central character including: a detailed lesson plan, engaging slideshow and printable, differentiated worksheets.

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Setting the scene

It’s time for your class to think where their stories will take place. Here, children will visit a variety of settings which depict the historical and environmental setting of the Arabian Nights stories: a bustling city souk, the glistening Arabian ocean and the unforgiving desert dunes.

Children will explore a range of writing tools to help them create vivid setting descriptions of their own, including: prepositional phrases, sensory language and personification. Make it real by setting up sensory stations for the children to see, touch, smell and taste items that you might find in an Arabian souk - incense, fruits, cinnamon and other spices etc.

This adventure story Lesson Pack is ready to teach, with a detailed lesson plan, engaging slides for input and differentiated activities, all at the click of a button.

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Planning an adventure story

Your children are now ready to plan out the plot points that take their character from their safe and predictable everyday life through to a volatile cliffhanger which will leave the King desperate to know what happens next.

Within this lesson, children will learn how to sequence high and low tension plot points in order to create an exciting and engaging story. They will also consider whether or not to use ‘a race against time’ to build tension throughout. Children can use the idea generating story pebbles to build the plot points of their story. Alternatively, if your class are more visually driven, they can chart their character's journey using the story map and icons provided.

Everything you need to teach this exciting lesson is included in the pack including: a detailed lesson plan, engaging slideshow and all the printable resources you need.

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Effective dialogue

In this lesson, children will analyse dialogue from the Arabian Nights stories to learn how authors use speech to convey character and advance the action in their writing.

Children will learn how to punctuate direct speech, why precise speech verb choice is important and explore varying sentence structure in their dialogue before drafting conversations between their chosen characters or using the fancy something different activity to explore dialogue through drama.

Teaching your class to create effective dialogue is a breeze with this Year 5 Lesson Pack, which includes: a detailed lesson plan, engaging slideshow and all the printable resources you need.

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Writing an adventure story

It’s time for your class to bring together everything they have learned to write their gripping adventure story. Will their story be exciting enough to make King Shahryar want to know what fate awaits their character?

Before children start to write, they will have the opportunity to explore traditional story openings and endings in order to inspire their own, suitable for an Arabian setting. Children can use the differentiated checklist to edit and improve their story as they write. If you are looking for an alternative, children can write their adventure story as an action-packed graphic novel.

This adventure writing Lesson Pack contains everything you need to produce an absorbing adventure story including: a detailed lesson plan, engaging slideshow, as well as printable, differentiated writing frames and checklists.

View Lesson 7