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.
📖 A visual companion to Lois Lowry's book. The movie is based on Lois Lowry's novel of the same name, itself a parody of old-fashioned orphan stories. Students who have read the book get a visual companion for comparing how the movie's tone, pacing, and details differ from the source material.
👨👩👧👦 A family built by choice, not by blood. The Willoughby children end up finding real security and care with a nanny and a candy maker rather than with the parents who share their name. Students see family portrayed as something people build through care and commitment rather than something automatically guaranteed by biology.
🧗 Resilience through repeated setbacks. The siblings are neglected, thrown out of their own home, separated into foster care, and forced to rescue the same parents who abandoned them, and they keep adapting through each setback. Students see persistence modeled through a string of genuine losses rather than a single easy obstacle.
🤝 A sibling team that has to work together to survive. Tim, Jane, and the twin Barnabys rely on each other and eventually on Linda to get through a series of increasingly dangerous situations, from surviving on their own to building a working aircraft. Students see teamwork portrayed as necessary rather than optional when the stakes keep rising.
🎭 Dark subject matter handled through comedy and fantasy. The story addresses real neglect and abandonment but frames it through slapstick, exaggerated visuals, and a narrating cat who keeps commenting on the action. Students get a clear example of how tone and framing can soften difficult subject matter without erasing it.
🧶 Trust rebuilt after a serious mistake. Tim's misplaced suspicion of Linda nearly costs the siblings the family they are starting to build, and he has to face the consequences of that mistake before trust can be repaired. Students see a character take real responsibility for a misjudgment rather than have it conveniently smoothed over.
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:
- Depicts ongoing parental neglect and emotional abuse played for dark comedy throughout.
- Includes children repeatedly imagining graphic, violent deaths for their parents, played as exaggerated fantasy rather than realistic threat.
- Contains cartoon peril, including a car pileup, a plane crash, and a near-fatal fall, with no lasting injury shown.
- Includes a brief scene of parents drinking wine.
- Ends with the parents being killed off screen by a shark, played for dark comic effect rather than as a realistic death.
- Contains no sexual content and only very mild toilet humor.
How My Movie Guide Helps You Teach It
📚 English Language Arts Teachers. The Willoughbys gives an ELA class a distinct narrative voice, a talking cat narrator, and a parody structure that pokes fun at old-fashioned orphan stories, along with a clear status as a book adaptation students can compare directly to Lois Lowry's novel. The guide is built for ELA with differentiated comprehension questions at multiple difficulty levels and writing tasks that push beyond simple recall.
🗣️ ESL and ELL Teachers. The movie's exaggerated visual style and clear, farcical storytelling make the plot easy to follow even for students still building their English, since so much of the humor and story come through visual gags and expression. The multiple choice question set may work well with ESL and ELL students, giving them a structured way to track the story alongside their classmates.
🎬 Substitute Teachers and Cover Lessons. Everything a substitute needs is self-contained and organized, with two sets of differentiated comprehension questions, a storyboard and synopsis task, and character writing and puzzle activities. Answer keys are included for the comprehension questions and puzzles, so a substitute can run the full session without having seen the movie.
🏠 Homeschool Parents. With two levels of comprehension questions, a storyboard and synopsis task, and a character writing activity with word search and crossword puzzles, the guide gives a homeschool parent a ready-made structure for a single student to work through independently. The puzzle activities in particular suit a single student working at their own pace.
💙 SEL Teachers. The movie spends its whole runtime on the weight of growing up neglected, from Tim's fantasy of his family's lost glory to the siblings warily learning to accept real care once Linda offers it. That trust is tested when Tim's suspicion of Linda nearly costs the family they are building, and he has to own the mistake and repair it before the story resolves. The guide does not include dedicated SEL activities, but the comprehension questions give students a structured task and keep them accountable during the viewing.
🌟 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 12-page classroom-ready resource.
Part 1: Comprehension Questions
Two sets of differentiated comprehension questions in chronological order, including 35 questions requiring full sentence answers and 35 multiple choice questions with 3 possible answers each. The multiple choice questions may also work well with ESL and ELL students. Answer keys are included.
Part 2: Storyboard and Synopsis
Students draw a 9 scene storyboard of what they believe are the most important parts of the movie, with a brief description for each scene, then use their storyboard as a guide to write a synopsis of the movie.
Part 3: Puzzles and Writing
A word search and crossword puzzle where 10 questions provide the words to find in the word search, alongside 5 additional words to find, with an answer key included. Students also write about one of the four Willoughby children of their choosing, draw a picture of that character, complete guided questions, and correctly use that character's name and pronouns throughout.
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.
