The Pirates Next Door (Jonny Duddle)

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Create an alternative version of the story in which a different family move into the house next door to Tilda’s house (e.g. a group of aliens or a family of astronauts). I think this is a great book and is suitable for years 1-3 in school. The illustrations are brilliant, exciting and add to the amusing nature of the story. It’s great to read aloud to a class of children and practicing pirate accents are a must! Rhyme is featured throughout the book which is an additional feature that makes it perfect to read aloud. A witness claimed this was not a spontaneous uprising but “a Design for some Considerable time past,” as the ringleaders had kept “a pyratt in their houses and threatened any that will offer to seize him.” Imagine that Tilda stowed away on the Jolley-Rogers’ ship when they left. Write a diary entry from her point of view.

This picture book has humorous rhyming text and pictures that combine the real and the fantastical, and could be an interesting way to explore ideas about prejudice.The population of Dull-on-Sea is 2222 and the average age is 67. Can you find out these statistics for towns and cities in your local area? Could you use this information to create graphs, charts and word problems? This book could be used to inspire creative writing. The children could be encouraged to use their imaginations to write their own story about who might move in next door to them and the effect that this would have on their neighbours! Carry out some role-play activities based on the characters in the book. Carry out some interviews to find out how each character feels at different points in the story. Write a persuasive letter to the council from the point of view of one of the residents of Dull-on-Sea, in which they explain how they feel about the arrival of this strange family.

Additionally, I think it is a great bedtime read between a parent/carer and a child. Due to the theme of the book I think it’s a fun way to encourage engagement in role play at home. Even the adults can get involved. Everyone finds dressing up good fun, especially when children are involved! Though there certainly is some truth in this characterisation, it is a gross over-generalisation. Many of these depictions and our understanding of the nature of the pirate are wrong. There are troves of evidence proving that a not insignificant number of these men were married, had strong family ties and connections to a community on land, were educated (at least to some extent) and came from families who enjoyed some degree of status in their respective societies.A native of New Orleans, Louisiana she is married and has two daughters. She and her husband, David, live in McLean, Virginia and Cape Cod, Massachusetts. I really enjoyed this book! I though that it was a great book with a great story as well as a good theme (moral?). I love how it rhymed and that it helped me to start better understand comic reading. I also loved that it is really good at teaching children that other people will have different opinions about others, but you can form your own opinions still, without judgement. The JRs bring with them a pirate ship with treasure chests and barrels full of grog, which causes consternation among the neighbours especially when the Dad continually shouts 'Oo-Arr!' Grandpa stays on the ship drinking while a three-year-old 'Urchin' called Nugget is very rascally.