level 3 Teacher’s notes Teacher Support Programme

Noughts and Crosses

Malorie Blackman group called the Freedom Fighters. He wants the man to
discover the name of their leader because he is worried
this group might destroy his plans to gain an important
government position. She is surprised to see the man her
father is talking to is a nought. Back in Callum’s house,
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Callum’s sister thinks she is a Cross because she believes

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she has dark skin, when in fact it is white like the rest of
the family.
Chapters 3–4: When Sephy arrives at school she sees
a crowd of Cross people shouting that they didn’t want
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blankers in their school. She tries to calm the situation and

inappropriately refers to the crowd as blankers. Later, she
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apologises to Callum for the use of the word but it has

About the author clearly hurt him more than she realised. He tells her to
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Malorie Blackman was born in London in 1962. She keep away from him at school for her own sake. When
wanted to become an English teacher but studied Callum returns home he sees a news story about the
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computer science instead. She worked in computers trouble at the school and sees Sephy saying the terrible
until she started writing when she was twenty-eight, and word again on the TV. Also on the news is Sephy’s father
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apart from books she also writes scripts for television threatening the Freedom Fighters with death. He goes to
programmes. She lists playing the piano and writing poems bed thinking that perhaps it isn’t a good idea to associate
as her hobbies and she lives in Kent with her husband. with Crosses. The next day, Sephy sits down to eat her
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lunch with Callum and some other noughts, but her

Summary teacher drags her back to her own table. The following
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Chapters 1–2: Meggie McGregor and her employer, day, Sephy is badly beaten up by some Cross girls and is
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Mrs Hadley, are watching two children playing in the confined to bed. Callum goes to visit her everyday but
garden. Callum is Meggie’s son and Sephy is Mrs Hadley’s is turned away by Mrs Hadley’s secretary. In Callum’s
daughter. Mrs Hadley’s husband, Kamal, arrives and hits house a fight breaks out between Jude and his sister
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his wife after discovering, with the innocent help of Lynette because she insists she is a Cross. Callum’s father
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Meggie, she had lied to him. Later, Meggie is told that breaks up the fight and explains the reasons for Lynette’s
Mrs Hadley no longer wants her to work for her. When behaviour. Three years previously, she and her Cross
they are sitting on a beach Callum kisses Sephy and then boyfriend, Jed, had been attacked by a group of nought
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begins to explain his worries about school. He has been men and the beating had seriously affected her brain.
admitted to Sephy’s school, which is an elite school for Chapters 5–6: Sephy overhears an argument between
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people like Sephy who are from a social group called her mother and father. He accuses her of being a drunk
the Crosses. Callum is from an inferior group called the and of not having allowed his son (by another woman)
noughts. Sephy is sad that Callum feels inferior and that into the family and she accuses him of having an affair.
the two groups are not allowed to mix. Callum returns Later in the evening they find their mother unconscious
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to his parent’s small house and is asked where he has after drinking an overdose of medicine. There are
been. His older brother Jude says he has been with a problems too in Callum’s house. Lynette walks out after
Cross girl but Callum denies this. He looks at his sister, a fight with Jude. Three hours later two policemen arrive
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Lynette, and recalls the day three years previously when with the news that she has died in an accident with a
she had lost her mind following an accident. Three years bus. That night, Callum finds her suicide note in his bed.
ago too, Sephy’s mother had changed and had become Several months later, Callum suspects his father and Jude
unhappy and started drinking. One night, Sephy hears her are in someway linked to the Freedom Fighters. One day
father refer to the noughts as ‘blankers’, a terrible name he arranges to see Sephy at a shopping centre but Jude
for them. He is talking to a man who has infiltrated a forbids him to go there on that particular afternoon.

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Noughts and Crosses

He meets Sephy and under his insistence they leave the and the group follow her. Callum allows her to escape,
building just before a bomb explodes. Back home he but just before she leaves she tells him she recognised
learns that the bomb had killed seven people. Jude admits Andrew Dorn as someone who works for her father.
to his mother he had placed the bomb in the centre and The group breaks up and Callum gets a job far from
she demands that he leaves the house. That night the home. He hears a radio report saying that Sephy could
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police raid the house and arrest Callum, his mum and his be pregnant. He returns home to see her and is caught
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dad, but not Jude because he isn’t in the house. The police in her garden and put in prison. Sephy’s father visits him
have found a drink can with Jude’s fingerprints on it near and gives him a terrible choice. If he agrees to a prison
the bomb site. Callum’s dad confesses to the crime and sentence and not death, then Sephy will have an abortion.
says that Jude must have innocently left his fingerprints on Her father gives Sephy the same choice. Both of them
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the drink can when it was in the house. He tells his wife know they can’t let their baby die. Callum goes to his
he did not place the bomb. death with the sound of Sephy’s loving voice in his ears
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Chapters 7–8: An anonymous donor (who we learn later and his words of love to her on his lips. A baby girl is born
is Mrs Hadley) has agreed to pay for an expensive lawyer and named Callie Rose McGregor.
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to defend Callum’s dad. At his trial, Callum’s dad pleads Background and themes
innocent but is found guilty. Two weeks later, Sephy is
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taken by her parents to witness the execution of Callum’s Racial discrimination: This is the central theme of the
father. However, just before the execution is due to be book. Because the noughts have different coloured skin
they are economically disadvantaged, their schools are
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carried out, the prison governor stops it and declares

that the sentence has been changed to life imprisonment. inferior, and the only interaction they can have with the
Callum’s father is not pleased because he was prepared Crosses is in the role of servants such as Mrs McGregor,
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to die and doesn’t want to remain in prison his whole life. and certainly not a romantic affair such as Callum and
Callum visits Sephy and informs her that her father had Sephy have.
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ordered the execution to be cancelled so that his father Rebellion: Some sections of the nought community are
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would have to stay in prison. They talk about the sad not prepared to accept their disadvantaged situation and
recent past and the problem between the Crosses and fight back with bombs and kidnapping. Callum is in the
the noughts. The mood is ugly at first, until the two kiss unfortunate situation of being in love with a person he is
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each other. A few days later, Callum’s father is killed while supposed to be at war with.
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trying to escape from prison. While Callum is thinking

about this in a café, his brother Jude approaches him and Discussion activities
asks if he wants to join the Freedom Fighters. He trains
Chapters 1–2
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with a gang of four others for three years and eventually

While reading (p. 4, after ‘Sephy, do you ever dream
Jude becomes his boss. One day he sends Sephy a note about … escaping?’)
asking her to meet him at the beach. When she arrives at 1 Discuss: Put the students in small groups and ask
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the beach she is kidnapped by Callum and his friends. them to discuss the following questions about
dreams: Do you often have dreams? Do you have the
Chapters 9–11: The group keep Sephy in a secret place. same dream many times? Do you tell anybody about
Before they send a ransom demand, Callum films Sephy your dreams?
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with a newspaper to prove they really have her. Andrew Do you sometimes have bad dreams? What is the
Dorn, one of the senior members of the Freedom strangest dream you have ever had? Do you think
dreams can tell us anything about the future?
Fighters, arrives to see Sephy and then tells the group
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that she must be killed. The group leave to pick up the After reading
ransom money and Callum and Sephy are left alone. They 2 Write and guess: Put students in pairs and ask them
to choose a short paragraph from Chapters 1–2.
admit that they do still love each other and sleep together.
Tell then to write it again, making five changes to
Jude returns an angry man because one of the group has words in the text. Students then read out their
been captured, and when he sees the two together a paragraphs to the other students who have to
fight breaks out. Sephy manages to run out of the house identify the mistakes.

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Noughts and Crosses

Chapters 3–4 9 Write and guess: On the board, write Sephy didn’t
Before reading have Callum’s number. Elicit which word is wrong
3 Discuss: Put the students in pairs and ask them to from the students (address not number). Now
talk about their first day at secondary school. Tell students choose a sentence from Chapters 7–8 and
them to consider the following questions: Were you rewrite it changing one word. Students walk around
the classroom, reading out their sentences and the
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nervous/excited/frightened when you arrived? Did your

parents take you to school? Did you make friends with other students have to identify and correct the
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anybody? Did you have a fight? Did you like/hate any of mistake.
the teachers? Chapters 9–11
While reading (p. 13, after ‘It was the end of another Before reading
bad day at school.’) 10 Predict and quiz: Put the students in pairs and
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4 Role play: Put the students in groups of three and read out the following questions: The group send
tell them they are going to act out a conversation a letter to/telephone/meet Sephy’s father? Callum
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between Sephy, Callum and the headmaster at the cuts off Sephy’s hair/finger/ear. A policeman/Callum/
end of the school day. The headmaster asks questions Jude helps Sephy to escape. Sephy’s dad wants to
about what has happened and Callum and Sephy give kill/look after/hide Sephy’s baby. Callum marries
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their accounts. Sephy/is executed/returns to his family. Sephy’s baby is

a boy/a girl/dead. After you finish the book check the
After reading student’s answers and the pair with the most correct
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5 Write: Ask the students to write a summary of answers wins.

Chapters 3–4. Tell them the summary must be
exactly 50 words long, not one more or less. They While reading (p. 45, after ‘No, you’re not,’ Dad said.)
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then read out their stories to the rest of the class 11 Role play: Put the students in pairs and tell
who vote for the best summary. them they are going to act out a conversation
between Sephy and her dad. Tell them to be very
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Chapters 5–6 argumentative and to make threats of what they will

While reading (p. 24, after ‘On the TV there were do if the other person doesn’t agree to their emands.
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pictures of people on the ground, broken windows,

blood.’) After reading
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6 Write and role play: Put the students in pairs and tell 12 Pair work: Write the following words on the board:
them they are going to be two television news newspaper, government, midnight, hotel, birthday,
reporters at the bomb scene. Tell them to write a grandfather, spy, cloth. Ask the students talk and
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news presentation based on what they know and to write in pairs to say how these words were used in
invent more information. Tell them to make the Chapters 9–11.
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presentation as lively as possible. See Discussion 13 Write and ask: On the board, write Who hit Sephy
activities key. across the face? Elicit the answer (Jude). Ask students
to write another question about something in
After reading Chapters 9–11. Now have students stand up and
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7 Game: Write the word person on the board. Then walk around the classroom, asking and answering
write the word unkind in front of it. Tell the students each other’s questions.
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that there are approximately 30 words in Chapter 5 14 Discuss: Remind the students that the book is about
that can be written before the word person to two groups of people who can’t live together, in this
describe a person’s feelings, character or physical case because of the colour of their skin. Then put
appearance. In pairs tell them they have 10 minutes them into small groups to discuss the following
to find as many of these words as possible. The pair questions: What can we do so people of different
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with the most words wins. coloured skin can live together? Do you think there are
the same problems with people of different religions or
Chapters 7–8 people from different nations or people that are poor
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While reading (p. 30, after ‘But there will be no and people that are rich? Can the government make
hanging today.’) laws to stop this problem happening? Do you have any
8 Discuss: Tell the students that some countries have friends that are not from your country?
the death penalty for serious crimes and some do 15 Research: Ask the students to look on the Internet
not. Then ask them to discuss the following questions: for reviews of the book and to find one bad review
Which countries execute criminals? Are people who are and one good one. Then the students read out their
guilty of serious crimes executed in your country? What reviews to the rest of the class.
are the serious crimes? Do you agree with executions?
Do they stop people doing crimes?

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