Frank Cottrell-Boyce

Frank Cottrell-Boyce speaks about and reads from his novel Sputnik's Guide to Life on Earth.

If you only do one thing...

We know that time can be tight when watching Authors Live events, so here's just one activity you could try while watching the broadcast. 

Reasons to save the world (HWB 2-01a, LIT 2-02a, LIT 2-09a)

In Sputnik's Guide to Life on Earth, Prez and Sputnik come up with a list of reasons to save the earth from destruction and add them to Sputnik’s guide Ten Things Worth Doing on Earth. All the things on the list have significance for Prez, and most are linked to happy memories of his grandad. For example, fish and chips was added as Prez used to sit by the river and eat fish and chips after a walk with his grandad. The tide was added as Prez treasures his grandad’s tide timetable.

As a class create your own list of reasons to save the world. You can either select ten things collectively, or increase the list size so that everyone in the class contributes something. As a class, create criteria for what goes on the list. Think about:

• Is it an object, place or feeling?
• What makes it special to you?
• Do you have happy memories associated with it?
• If an alien visited earth, what is the one thing you would want to show or tell him/her?

You could create a display of your class list and decorate it with items such as photos or maps which link to the things on your list.

For more ideas for exploring space in your classroom, see our space learning activities below.

For shorter clips from this event visit the BBC Scotland Learning(this link will open in a new window) website.

A full transcript of this event is available to download.