Each month we produce a Chatterpack with a different theme to help with session ideas for Chatterbooks children's reading clubs. A recent Chatterpack was Fantastical Creatures themed which went down really well with the Chippenham Chatterbooks club. Here, group leader Sara Miles tells us how they used the Chatterpack for a Chatterbooks session.

For some of the boys in our Chatterbooks group, this month's theme was perfect, as they love fantasy books and anything to do with dragons or other fantastical creatures! Here's what we did in our Chatterbooks meeting:

On arrival: We had a selection of Septimus Heap activity sheets, great because there was a range for all abilities.

Icebreaker: We talked about our favourite fantastic beasts (Drake's Comprehensive Compendium of Dragonology was a great resource to pore over!).

Activity: We showed a video of Cressida Cowell explaining how to talk Dragonese - from How to Train Your Dragon. Then we set the children a challenge, working in groups, to act out a scene on how they would train their own dragon (they used the Dragonese dictionary to help them). After their favourite snacks we did another activity - making a flying dragon. This was ready-prepared (by group leaders) and just needed assembling with string and decorating. The children - boys and girls - were very proud of their dragons and went away with some magical new books to read from the library.

Get involved

Scroll through the Fantastical Creatures Chatterpack

Or download the whole Chatterpack.

Take a look at some of our other Chatterpacks including a new one themed on Sea Quest, the new Adam Blade series.