By Mr Hull's Movie Guides
Watch the Trailer
Why Watch This Movie With Your Students
Here's what your students naturally take away from the movie, whether through themes, values, ideas, or perspectives.
🗝️ Gives students a genuinely different version of Oz. New characters like Tik-Tok, Jack Pumpkinhead, and the Gump come straight out of Baum's Oz books, and none of them appear in the version most students have already seen. It works well as a comparison piece for classes familiar with the Judy Garland movie.
🧠 Puts a child's credibility at the center of the story. Dorothy is disbelieved by the adults around her and is nearly sent for electrotherapy to cure her memories of Oz, which gives students something concrete to react to about trust and authority. Her insistence on what she knows to be true drives the entire plot.
🐔 Follows an unusual cast of allies built for problem solving. Tik-Tok, Jack Pumpkinhead, and Billina the talking chicken each contribute a different skill to the group's survival, and students can track how the team works through a series of obstacles together. None of them are the friends Dorothy had the first time around.
👑 Builds tension around a villain who reshapes Oz itself. The Nome King has turned the Emerald City's citizens to stone and hidden them as ornaments, so restoring Oz becomes a puzzle Dorothy has to solve rather than a battle she can fight her way through. Princess Mombi's shifting identity adds another layer of uncertainty to who can be trusted.
💪 Shows courage functioning under real pressure. Dorothy keeps going even after repeated setbacks, guessing wrong twice before finding the Scarecrow among the Nome King's ornaments. Her persistence gives students a clear, low-drama example of resilience without needing a lecture about it.
📚 Offers a natural link back to the original Oz books. Because this story comes from Baum's own novels rather than a retelling of the earlier movie, it gives students a reason to treat the books and each screen version as separate creative choices. That distinction opens up discussion about what changes and what stays the same when a story moves from page to screen.
Age Suitability and Content
This movie is rated PG.
📋 A free editable parent permission slip is available for this movie. It explains the educational benefits of watching movies in class and includes a space for parental consent. → Download Free Permission Slip on TpT (Free resource)
⚠️ Things to be aware of:
- Dorothy is threatened with electroshock therapy by an adult doctor early in the movie.
- Several scenes feature frightening imagery, including a character who changes heads and a chase sequence through a hall of screaming heads.
- The Nome King and his rock creatures pursue the main characters in an intense extended chase near the end of the movie.
- There is no sexual content, strong language, or substance use in the movie.
How My Movie Guide Helps You Teach It
📚 English Language Arts Teachers. Return to Oz gives an ELA class a genuine book-to-screen adaptation to study, built from two of Baum's actual Oz novels instead of retelling the more familiar movie version. The guide's three tiers of comprehension questions let you differentiate by ability, while the synopsis and character writing tasks push students past simple recall into organizing and describing the story in their own words.
🗣️ ESL and ELL Teachers. The movie's clear, sequential plot and its multiple choice question set give ESL and ELL students a structured way to follow along and check their understanding. The guide's differentiated question sets make it easy to match the reading demand to where individual students are.
🎬 Substitute Teachers and Cover Lessons. Hand it to a sub and walk away. Everything a substitute needs is included, with organized materials and answer keys for the comprehension question sets, so the session can run without the substitute having seen the movie beforehand.
🏠 Homeschool Parents. The movie gives a home learner a different Oz story to dig into, built from two of Baum's actual novels instead of the movie most kids have already seen. The guide's storyboard, synopsis, and character writing tasks work well for a single student, and the map of Oz activity gives a hands-on way to process what happened in the story.
🌟 Supporting All Learners Movie guides can be a wonderfully calm fit for students with autism, learning difficulties, and mild to severe disabilities. The structured format gives every student a clear purpose during viewing, easing uncertainty and allowing them to engage at their own pace. If you teach in a special education or learning support setting, you may find this guide a gentle and practical resource. Find out more about why movies work for diverse learners.
What's Inside the Guide
This is a 15-page classroom-ready resource.
Part 1: Comprehension Questions
Three sets of differentiated questions in chronological order, with answer keys included: 45 questions requiring full sentence answers, a shorter 30 question set with 15 removed from the full set, and 30 multiple choice questions with 3 answer options each. The multiple choice set works well with ESL and ELL students.
Part 2: Storyboard, Synopsis, and Character Writing
Students draw a 9 scene storyboard of what they consider the most important parts of the movie, with a brief description for each scene, then use that storyboard to write a synopsis of the movie. They also choose one character to write about and illustrate.
Part 3: Map of Oz and Route Description
Students draw a map of Oz based on what they saw in the movie, including 8 key landmarks, then draw the route Dorothy took from her arrival to the Nome King's Mountain and describe that journey from Billina the chicken's point of view.
“Return to Oz Movie Guide + Activities is a great way to get students thinking critically while enjoying the film. The activities are well-structured, interactive, and make the movie experience both educational and entertaining.”
— Margaret S.
How These Guides Work: From Movie to Lesson
A movie is not a break from learning. It reaches students through sight, sound, and story at once, engaging the brain in ways text alone does not, and the structured work around it is what turns the viewing into a genuine lesson. You can read the research behind this on the Why Movies Work page.
- A Teacher Notes and General Directions page opens the guide with a brief overview of everything inside: what the movie is about, then each part of the guide in order with a short description of what it entails. You know what to expect from the whole resource before you hand out a single page, so you can pick up the guide cold and teach it the same day.
- Answer keys are included for the comprehension question sets, so grading is quick and you are not rewatching the movie to check answers. Some guides also include example answers for the creative and written activities.
- Print and go: classroom ready, with no additional preparation needed. Print one the morning you need it and the lesson is ready.
- Substitute and first-timer friendly. A guide can be handed to a substitute or picked up by a teacher covering the topic for the first time. Nobody running the session needs to have seen the movie.
- Differentiated comprehension sets. Most guides include two or three question sets at different difficulty levels, and most include a multiple-choice option that works well for ESL and ELL students. One class set covers your strongest readers, your strugglers, and your language learners without separate prep.
- Activities that go beyond recall. Each guide includes structured activities that ask students to engage with the movie, not just watch it, ranging from creative and written tasks to discussion and critical thinking questions depending on the guide. That variety matters in a mixed classroom: a student who freezes on a written question set may show real understanding through a drawing or a creative task, and a confident writer gets room to go beyond recall. For the teacher, it turns a movie session into work that can actually be assessed: comprehension questions show whether students followed the plot, and the activities beyond them show whether they understood it.
