To use the information in the text to make a prediction about the parents' decisions.
Let's practise
Are your children peaky and thin?
Too many late nights? Too much telly?
Forest air and a fattening diet
Will very soon put things right.
A week or two at Sweetmeat Cottage
Is bound to make them scrumptiously chubby.
Children just love my gingerbread house,
My liquorice doors and chimneys.
There's everything here to delight a child,
And one kind lady to see to their needs
For I love children, tasty little darlings!
Apply without delay.
C.J.D. Doyle: 'Advertisement' from The Works, ed. John Foster (Macmillan, 2014)
This poem is written to persuade parents to send their children to Sweetmeat Cottage.
Do you think parents might send their children there? Explain why.
1 mark
- Read the question. Read it again. What is it asking?
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- Look for clues that might appeal to parents.
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Forest air, everything to delight a child, a kind lady who loves children. They might feel guilty if they have let their children have too many late nights or haven't fed them properly.
- Are there any clues that might not appeal to parents?
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They might not want their children getting fat. They might question what the lady means by 'I love children, tasty little darlings'.
- Decide which answer you are going with. Use clues from the text to support your answer.
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I think parents won't send their children to the cottage, because, although they might feel they need forest air, the other suggestions don't sound healthy, like fattening them up (they might eat the gingerbread house and the liquorice) and the fact that the lady thinks children are 'tasty'!
- Check your answer.