Flotsam: 1

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The boy uses a magnifying glass to look at seaside creatures. Could you use one to look closely at different objects? Can you explain how a magnifying glass works? The camera concept feels very familiar to me. I'm sure I've seen this but with a camera phone. The discoverer took pictures of themselves and then left the phone to be discovered by someone else. The phone travelled all over the world. I just can't remember where I saw this, whether it was a news item or part of a TV show.

Themes include imaginative undersea worlds; invented creatures; light and cameras; microscopes and collections of natural specimens; floating and sinking; biodegradability and rubbish; geography and ocean currents; historical timelines and community cohesion; as well as numerous opportunities for writing, drama, music, art and dance. 1 | Plot synopsis

Find a Scheme of Work

Look at a map and find your closest beach. How far away is it? How could you travel there? How long might the journey take? Working in an open space, put large sheets of paper on the floor, each with a picture on it. Children should move around the room, looking at the pictures and generating interesting questions. Make a glossary of sea-themed words, including vocabulary from the book’s title and blurb (e.g. flotsam, floating, ashore, barnacle). Pair them, asking them to mirror each other’s movements, then progress to a ‘conversation’, where one child makes a movement answered by a different movement from their partner.

Create some captions, speech and thought bubbles to accompany the beautiful illustrations in the book. Flotsam” is a 2007 Caldecott Award winning book by David Wiesner, author of the popular books, “Tuesday” and “The Three Pigs.” In this story, a young boy discovers a mysterious camera from the sea that eventually shows him another world under the sea. “Flotsam” is surely one classic that cannot be beat. Identify the geographical features of beaches and coastlines. Can you create a report about some of them? Take the initial sequence of images where the boy is swamped by the wave and finds the camera, and the sequence at the end, where the boy is again splashed by the wave (which reclaims his pictures). Talk about the images with your class. How would it feel to be experiencing these events? Talk about the idea of ‘six degrees of separation’. How many countries are your children connected with, via holidays or links with family and friends? How might you present this information in charts or diagrams?

This is a three-week Writing Root for Flotsam by David Wiesner in which children dicsover a range of ‘Flotsam’ items (either after a visit to the seaside, or that have appeared in the classroom). One item is a camera that contains mysterious photographs that the children must investigate. These photos come from the book Flotsam by David Wiesner. Children go on to read and reflect on the book, making predictions and retelling orally and in writing. Later in the sequence of learning, the children have the opportunity to create their own sequel to the story, called Jetsam, where they write the story of the child who next finds the camera. As an optional additional study, this could also link to a study of the history of cameras and report writing about this and could include a historical link about the way cameras have changed the way history is recorded. Synopsis of Text: David Wiesner’s wordless, imaginative and exuberantly detailed picture book, Flotsam (Clarion Books, 2006), is a joy to share with children at KS2.

Wordless, seasides, adventures, mystery, cameras, oceans, under the sea, life cycles, human connection P.S. If you love this story and want to watch something similar, try out this incredible 8-minute wordless short by Peter Lewis, which has the same amazing but eerie feel as this book: THE CAMERA http://vimeo.com/32655795

Take the topic outdoors

The underwater camera has a film inside. Can you find out how these cameras work? How are they different from digital cameras? One of the reasons I love Wiesner’s work is that he comes up with ideas I would never think about. A mysterious camera would be something a child would want to keep so the lesson here is to see if the boy understands the long-term goal of the obviously amazing camera. An enjoyable read. Extend this into a dramatic scenario where a child taunts the waves. Ask your class to explore this via body movements.

Then give the children Post-it notes and ask them to supply answers to the questions generated by others.They should be as imaginative as possible. Using a camera with roll film, photograph close-up details of well-known landmarks in your neighbourhood, or views seen from an unusual angle. Children will enjoy getting an overview of the story as a class, then exploring the book individually afterwards. How many different creatures and plants can you identify in the illustrations? Can you write a report about one (or more) of them? Flotsam is a children's wordless picture book written and illustrated by David Wiesner. Published by Clarion/Houghton Mifflin in 2006, it was the 2007 winner of the Caldecott Medal; [1] the third win for David Wiesner. The book contains illustrations of underwater life with no text to accompany them.Again, use the images (and messages, if there are any) to generate ideas about who these people could have been. What are these creatures called? What are their habitats and life cycles? Ask children to draw and write about them, creating entries for an encyclopedia about newly discovered underwater life. The book is completely devoid of any dialogue - which is its great advantage: although a few English words on its cards they are not essential to understanding and enjoying the story. This allows for Flotsam to be enjoyed by all as it is not bound by any language, like classical music. This book is very thought-provoking. The illustrations are beautiful and the story is easy to follow. This is one of my favorites this year. How would these creatures move? With each child holding part of the creature, groups must animate them like puppets, making them swim around the room.