Reading Activities
These three reading activities aim to develop pupils' understanding and analytical skills.
If you use a screen reader, please be aware that the reading order is better in the PDF versions of the activities.
We would be grateful if you could fill in this evaluation form after using these readings.
'Who was Walter Scott?' (Upper primary nonfiction reading):
'Who was Walter Scott' is a two-page reading activity for upper primary pupils. After reading information on Scott's life, pupils should answer ten understanding questions (five true/false questions and five longer ones). After responding to these five questions, pupils can discuss a further five questions, which have open-ended answers. The answers are given on the final page, so please remove this page before giving the document to pupils.
This activity works well alongside the 'Who was Walter Scott' PowerPoint, the game, and the short poems activity, which can be found in the standalone activites page. Click here to navigate to the standalone activities page.
View 'Who was Walter Scott' as a word document.
View 'Who was Walter Scott' as a PDF document.
View the 'Who was Walter Scott' PowerPoint. There are discussion questions for each piece of information in this PowerPoint; it is recommended that some of these are deleted before the PowerPoint is used.
Click here for the Game. You will also need a dice and counters for the game.
Click here for the link to the short poems page.
'Towards an Overview of Children's Scottish Literature' (lower secondary):
'Towards an Overview of Children's Scottish Literature' is a non-fiction reading activity based on an article about the history of Scottish children's literature that originally appeared in the Association for Scottish Literature's The Bottle Imp. It considers Scott's Tales of a Grandfather alongside Catherine Sinclair's children's book, Holiday House. After the text, there are understanding questions, analysis questions, and questions for further discussion. The final page has the answers, so please delete this page before giving the activity to pupils.
Click here for 'Towards an Overview of Scottish Children's Literature' in a Word document.
Click here for 'Towards an Overview of Scottish Children's Literature' in a PDF document.
'The Bard's Incantation' (lower secondary):
This reading activity is based on three stanzas of poetry by Walter Scott. There are two sets of questions. The first should be possible for most pupils to answer, and the second are more challenging. The final page has the answers, so please delete this page before giving the activity to pupils.
If you are using a screen reader, please be aware that the poem is spread over pages 1 and 2, but the questions start on page 1. You will, therefore, hear the questions for lines 16-24 before you read this part of the poem.
This work was supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council Grant Number AH/V011111/1.
It is part of The Edinburgh Edition of Walter Scott's Poetry: Engaging New Audiences. It was developed by Dr Anna Fancett as part of the Walter Scott Research Centre at the University of Aberdeen with the support of Abbotsford, Scott's home in the Scottish Borders and The Association for Scottish Literature.
