Guy Bass learning resource
Fun, creative activities inspired by Spynosaur, Stitch Head andDinkin Dings and the Double from Dimension 9
CfE Level 2 (Age 8-11)
Resource created by Scottish Book Trust
About this resource
This resource is inspired by three of Guy Bass’ fantastic books for children. However, we hope you’ll find transferrable ideas in here that you can use with lots of different books in different contexts.
Adapt and use as you see fit – the resource isn’t intended to be prescriptive or authoritative and you’ll want to shape it and take what’s useful to engage your learners.
The resource has been created to support our Authors Live event
About Guy Gass
Guy is an award-winning authorwhose children's books series include Stitch Head, Spynosaur,The Legend of Frog, Dinkin Dings and Atomic!In 2010 Dinkin Dings and the Frightening Things won the Blue Peter Award for Most Fun Book with Pictures.
Activities for Spynosaur
Character creation: heroes and villainsEng 2-31a
Spynosauris full of heroes and villains, most of whom have an accompanying profile at some point in the book.
Ask your pupils to come up with a hero for a spy or action novel. You can use these key questions to get pupils forming a heroic character:
- What does your character want more than anything in the world?
- What is he/she afraid of?
- What are their most important strengths and weaknesses?
- Who is their best friend?
- Would you want to be their friend? Why/why not?
All these questions can help pupils make choices about their action scenes in the next task too.
You can also ask pupils to come up with gadgets for their hero to use – these can be vehicles, weapons, surveillance equipment and more. Ask your pupils what problems they think their hero might face in their daily fight against crime: this will help them create gadgets to counter these problems.
Finally, it’s time for your pupils to create some villains for their heroes to fight against. Many of the villains in Spynosaurhave been created by combining two things into one: for instance, ninja snowmen and a robot witch. Can your pupils come up with villains in the same way?
Write an action sceneEng 2-31a
Your pupils can use the heroes and villains they have created to write an action scene just like the ones in the book.
There are several stages to a good action scene. You can use the ninja snowmen scene on pages 35-41 of Spynosauras an example. Use the following questions to help your pupils plan their scene:
- When will the enemies see each other for the first time?
- What different weapons/attacks will your villain use in the scene?
- What will your hero do to defend themselves from attack?
- Will your hero face any other obstacles in the scene (egSpynosaur has to dodge trees as he skis away from the snowmen)?
- How will your hero eventually defeat the villain?
Activities forStitch Head
Activity 1 – Create Your Own Monster(Exa 2-02a, Lit 2-20a, Lit 2-26a, Lit 2-28a, Eng 2-27a)
Professor Erasmus is continually creating savage monsters, meaning that Stitch Head has to get to work with his potions to cure them!
Ask your pupils to create their own monster. They should begin with a ‘list of ingredients’ for the monster just like the one on page 35 of the book.
After this, get them to draw a picture of the monster, accompanied by a written description.
When this is done, the pupils must now think of a potion which will provide an antidote to the monster. Get them to think about all the characteristics of the monster which would need to change in order to make it harmless. They should name their potion and write a label for it like the label on page 28 of the book.
To take this further, the pupils could produce a class guide book on dealing with monsters, with their pictures and descriptions of monsters next to a description of the potion needed to cure them. They can also extend the writing further by describing how to deal with the monster if it attacks: how it moves, where its weak points are, etc.
Activity 2 – Monster Poems(Lit 2-20a, Eng 2-31a, Eng 2-27a, Exa 2-02a)
As a variation of Activity 1, pupils can draw a picture of their monster and write a poem describing it.
After this, you can use the online tool Wallwisher to bring together the pupils’ poems and create your own online area full of frightening creatures, just like the Professor’s basement!
How to use Wallwisher:
Activities forDinkin Dings and the Double from Dimension 9
Activity 1 – Create a new anti-terror device (Eng 2-27a)
On page 14 of the book, some of Dinkin’s anti-danger devices are listed. The names of these devices use alliteration to make them more catchy, for example, Dinkin’s Tornado Trapping Trousers.
Introduce your pupils to the effects of alliteration by showing them these advertising slogans:
Then, get the pupils to write down some of their fears, much like Dinkin does when he discovers ‘sixty one new terrors’ on page 61. Challenge them to create devices to combat these fears. Their device names should use alliteration to make them catchy!
Activity 2 – See the world through Dinkin’s eyes! (Lit 2-25a, Exa 2-02a)
Dinkin constantly looks at everyday objects and finds a reason to be frightened of them.
Ask your pupils to imagine they are Dinkin and they have just walked into the classroom. Ask them to list ten objects in their classroom, and then next to each object they should write a reason Dinkin might be frightened of it (for example, Dinkin might worry about finding himself trapped in the folds of the blinds, or transported inside the smartboard!)
As an extension of the activity, you could ask pupils to take a photograph of the classroom and then label the photograph with the potential dangers they have identified. You could even get them to import their photo into a Powerpoint presentation and then label it. There is a good tutorial at this website:
If you and your pupils loved Guy’s booksLit 2-11a
Try our list of funny titles:
For other fantastic cross-curricular resources visit scottishbooktrust.com/resources.