Adventure stories often contain places and objects that seem to demand a picture: a mysterious doorway, a distant island or an unusual piece of equipment. Drawing and design can help children explore what they imagine from a passage, particularly when a setting is not illustrated in detail. The activity works best when the book remains the starting point and the child’s own inventions are recognised as inventions.
Begin with a short extract
Choose a descriptive paragraph that contains enough information to picture a scene without prescribing every detail. Ask children to listen or read once, then name three words or phrases that stood out. They might identify a shape, a texture, the weather or the feeling of the place. Encourage them to sketch an initial impression before searching for online images. This allows the language to influence their design directly. If the passage is from a published novel, keep a note of the details actually supplied so that later discussion does not confuse imagination with canon.
Design to answer a question
A drawing becomes more thoughtful when the artist considers how something works. If designing a fictional travelling vehicle, ask who uses it, what it carries and how people enter and leave. If designing a dragon school, consider paths, doors, open spaces and places where pupils can meet safely. These prompts do not establish the author’s actual architecture. They invite children to make choices and explain them. A spectacular picture may be exciting, but a small practical detail often shows greater engagement with the imagined world.
Experiment with scale and viewpoint
Ask a child to draw the same invented courtyard from the ground and from above. What changes? A high viewpoint makes routes and shapes clearer, while a person standing beside a large creature may notice height and shadow. A simple figure for scale can help viewers understand the scene. Children need not produce technically accurate perspective drawing to explore the idea. They can annotate their sketch with a few words or explain it aloud. The aim is to notice how artistic choices affect what another person understands about the fictional setting.
Use materials that encourage revision
Pencil and paper are sufficient, though collage, recycled card or digital drawing may appeal to some children. Encourage a small plan before a complicated model, particularly if the design has doors, supports or moving parts. Revision is part of the activity: a bridge may need widening, a doorway moving or a map simplifying. Ask what the change achieves rather than praising only neatness. Children who feel less confident writing may be able to explain a sophisticated design verbally and then add a short caption in their own words.
Example: a floating travelling circus
The title Sammy Rambles and the Floating Circus can inspire a design challenge without claiming that a child’s drawing reproduces the book’s actual circus. Invite children to imagine how a fictional floating performance space might admit visitors, hold equipment and travel safely. They can choose a scale, create a poster for an invented act or sketch a viewing platform. Label the project ‘inspired by the title’ until the published text supplies real details. Afterwards, compare the child’s ideas with what the author actually describes, rather than presenting speculation as an illustration of a confirmed scene.
Connect visual choices to storytelling
A narrow dark passage can signal mystery; a wide sunlit square may suggest relief or discovery. Ask what feeling the child wants their design to produce and which visual elements create it. Colour, texture and the placement of figures all contribute. Then return to the book and notice how the writer uses words for a similar purpose. A drawing can reveal that the child pictured a setting very differently from another reader. Neither interpretation is necessarily incorrect when the passage leaves details open. That variety is part of the imaginative pleasure of prose.
Create a usable story map
Maps can help children organise a sequence of events or design a new adventure. Mark where the characters begin, identify obstacles and connect places with paths. If the map records a published story, include only locations confirmed by the text. If it is a new invention, give the child freedom to add rivers, bridges and imaginary settlements. A legend explains symbols to another reader. Ask whether the routes make sense for the characters and whether important places are missing. The map can then guide a short piece of writing or an oral story.
Display the work thoughtfully
A classroom exhibition can show how one passage led to different interpretations. Invite children to include a sentence from the story where appropriate, alongside an explanation of what they chose to add. Avoid ranking the drawings only by artistic polish. A simple labelled sketch may contain more careful reading than an elaborate picture copied from a screen. Give children options about whether their work is displayed and how their names are used. The conversation should focus on connections between text and creative decisions, not competition over who draws the best dragon.
Keep drawing connected to reading enjoyment
Not every chapter needs an art project. Some children prefer to continue the story, and that should be respected. A quick sketch can be enjoyable precisely because it is optional. Families reading Sammy Rambles can use the official free chapter to identify a setting worth imagining and then return to the narrative. Where the author’s description is brief, a child’s invention can fill the page without being presented as a published fact. The most successful design activity makes a reader curious to look again at the words that started it.
Comparing designs without choosing a winner
Invite two children to sketch the same invented doorway from a fantasy passage. One may make it tall and welcoming; the other may picture a narrow entrance hidden behind plants. Ask each child which words suggested their choice and which details they invented. Both pictures may be reasonable if the passage is open to interpretation. A comparison should not become an argument about which child draws more realistically. The discussion can also reveal a genuine difference in understanding: perhaps someone missed that the door was made of stone. Returning to the sentence gives readers a reason to look closely, while leaving room for artistic freedom wherever the text is silent.
A short review with the young designer
Ask the child to explain one part of the design that a viewer might not understand. Perhaps the strange shape is a roof that collects rainwater or the narrow opening is intended for a small creature. Invite a simple annotation rather than redesigning the whole picture for them. Then ask which detail came from the story. This conversation respects the artist’s reasoning and gives an opportunity to correct a misunderstanding of the passage without dismissing the drawing itself.