‘Winter’ by Judith Nicholls
Classroom Activities
These activities can be undertaken in isolation or in sequence as time and ability of
children allows.
Opening up
Listen to Judith Nicholls read her poem Winter and then read as a group
 Listen to both Chopin’s Winter Wind and Debussy – The Snow is Dancing. They
portray two different faces of winter. How do they make you feel? What words
would you use to describe each piece? How are they different? What might be
happening to the landscape in each piece of music?
 Dramatise a verse from Winter. Think about the mood of your chosen verse. How
can you vary the pace and volume of your delivery? Can you repeat certain
words for effect? Does alternating the reader work? Could you use the music
above to underscore the reading?
Climbing Inside
 As a group, gather all the verbs from the poem. Can you find any connections
between them?
 Discuss these verbs. Do they remind you of certain animals? Do you have an
image of a particular animal in your mind? Or even a creature in your
imagination?
 Use a thesaurus to write down other verbs which have a similar meaning. Use
Pupil Worksheet 1 to jot down your findings.
 Nicholls has made winter into a real, living, breathing creature. Find an image of
an animal you have in mind or simply draw the creature. Surround the image
with verbs that you have collected. Look carefully at the animal’s body. How
would it move?
Building upon
 The children can then create their own version of Winter. Pupil Worksheet 2 is a
cloze exercise which allows for imaginative alternatives to Nicholls’s original
poem. The gaps left are mostly verbs but the 2nd line of each verse calls for a
vivid adjective. Winter might change character with each verse or remain
constant.
 More able pupils may wish to create entirely new poems, using an animal as an
extended metaphor to capture the essence of winter. ENJOY!
Other stimuli to try:
 Sting’s Christmas at Sea would make for atmospheric background working
music. The words were inspired by a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson.
 Exhibition at the Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh from 24th Jan- 20th April
Mammoths of The Ice Age. Visitors are encouraged to feel mammoth fur
By Emma Speedy for the Scottish Poetry Library’s education blog http://makingmakars.wordpress.com/
‘Winter’ by Judith Nicholls
Classroom Activities


beneath their fingertips and touch replica teeth...Wonderful sensory inspiration.
Allows for winter creativity through an icy animal!
Climb to a place with a great wintry view. Consider how winter might weave its
way through that scene...
Read the opening Chapter of Dickens’s Bleak House - a memorable description
of winter fog.
By Emma Speedy for the Scottish Poetry Library’s education blog http://makingmakars.wordpress.com/