Foundation/y1.

Mr Magnolia

This 1980s classic picture book is probably to be found in most primary schools and if it’s not in yours it’s easily available. It’s a nonsense poem about the eccentric Mr Magnolia who has a number of unusual possessions including a frog, a toad and a newt, some very fat owls who are learning to hoot and green parakeets who pick holes in his suit. But, as we’re continually reminded, one of his boots is missing.
The temptation might be to use this book simply as a tool to develop the concept of rhyming words and indeed children do latch on to this element very quickly, but it might be more fun to explore and exploit the story imaginatively in the following way:

A Mr Magnolia Bird-feeding Station
You will need:
One old shoe or boot for each child
Acrylic paints
Some straw (pet-shops usually stock this)
Birdseed/nuts

• Read the story to the class ensuring children have access to both pictures and words
• Discuss the book with the children: ask questions such as: ‘can you remember what Mr Magnolia keeps in his pond?’ using the pictures as clues, ending up with a question about the one thing he’s missing – his boot.
• Invent your own story about what might have happened to the other boot. For example you saw a man on a scooter accidentally stepping out of his boot and before he was able to retrieve it a pair of dark birds flew down and carried it off, one lace in each beak.
• Allow children to speculate about where the boot might now be and what the birds might have wanted it for.
• Take the children outside and look for signs of the boot (you will have already filled a boot with birdseed and placed it somewhere high up – on a low roof or lodged in a tree. I f you’re really lucky, birds will already have discovered it).
• At this point it might be a good idea to point out to the children that this is an invented story and that  it was you who put the boot on the roof!
• Explain to the children that they’re going to make their own bird-feeders using old boots (they’ll probably be keen for birds to use them as nests). Remind them about Mr Magnolia and his dress style and discuss what his missing boot might look like.
• Children paint their boot.
• When the boots are dry they can be filled with straw and birdseed and hung from a tree or playground structure to create a Mr Magnolia bird-feeding station.