Inspiration in Narrative Planning and Writing.

1. Inspiration in Narrative Planning and Writing. Effective Methods of Narrative Planning and Writing. Ideas That Actually Work! G. McCormack.

2. Essentials For Young Writers • Reading a variety of books everyday. • Home reading – reading diary • Global awareness – BTN • Discussion – peer to peer • Media (films, television, magazines, newspapers etc.) • Story telling – Tell them stories of your life. G. McCormack.

3. The Foundations • Sentence structure • Vocabulary – vocab bank • Use of expressive language • Grammar and punctuation • Confidence The following activity can help brush up on these aspects of writing. G. McCormack.

4. Simplifying Complex Text Read a text with the class and identify the aspects that make it more interesting. Then break it down into its simplest form and highlight how boring it sounds.

5. SIMPLIFIED VERSION I WALKED TO THE PRINCIPAL’s office. My shoes were squeaky. I felt nervous. I knocked on the door. COMPLEX VERSION I ambled nervously towards the principal’s office. The hall was silent. I could hear my shoes squeaking like mice as I got closer to my pending doom. I stood outside his door. My body began to shake like a leaf. I could feel my heart beating in my chest like a big bass drum. I clenched my fist tight as I reluctantly knocked.

6. Expanding Simple Text. G. McCormack.

7. Things that you may wish to identify are: SIMILLIES METAPHORS ADJECTIVES ADVERBS ADVERBIAL PHRASES Provide the class with a very boring storyand ask them tospice it upusing the features identified previously. I walked home from school. I saw a man outside my neighbours house. I found my keys. I went inside my house. G. McCormack.

8. A Three-step Narrative Step 1: Introduction or orientation. • Step 2: Complication. • Step 3: Resolution. G. McCormack.

9. Step 1-Brainstorm • The Title. LOST • Children are asked to brainstorm everything they know about the word ‘lost’ • Ask the children (in pairs) to think about: • Personal experiences of being lost or losing something. • Films they have seen involving something being lost. • Books they may have read where something or somebody is lost. • These ideas are shared as a class and children are welcome to note down any ideas that interest them. G. McCormack.

10. JOB TREASURE CONFIDENCE LOST CAR KEYS MONEY PASSPORT BABY BROTHER FRIENDS G. McCormack.

11. Choose a topic that interests you! • Remember that you want the children to feel confident so make sure that they know that no answer can be wrong. • Essentially, you want the children to be writing about a subject they have knowledge of and a subject they enjoy. • Thus, the writer is engaged and enjoying what he or she is writing about, with some knowledge of the vocabulary involved within their topic. G. McCormack.

12. JOB TREASURE CONFIDENCE LOST CAR KEYS MONEY PASSPORT BABY BROTHER FRIENDS G. McCormack.

13. A Three-step Narrative • Step 1: Introduction or orientation. • Step 2: Complication. • Step 3: Resolution. G. McCormack.

14. Step 2 - Setting • After the child has selected the topic of their narrative, it’s important that they chose a setting which is appropriate. • An appropriatesetting is one which the children have been exposed to. • Often children want to choose setting which they have no knowledge of. • Thus, the language within the narrative is somewhat limited. For example, if I ask you to describe Kuala Lumpur but you have never been there or experienced it. You would find it very hard. G. McCormack.

15. Counteracting Wrong Setting Selection. For those children who lack inspiration when choosing a setting, ask the children to think about settings: • They have recently visited. • They are reading about in guided or shared reading. • Is linked to a current topic (space shuttle – space) (A boat – historical exploration). G. McCormack.

16. The Planning Progress What the children have so far: • A title (LOST) • A main focus for the narrative (Car Keys) • A setting they have knowledge of (Playground) The children are already starting to form some kind of story in their minds. (Imagine a canvas where the background is painted but the fine details are missing.) G. McCormack.

17. A Three-step Narrative • Step 1: Introduction or orientation. • Step 2: Complication. • Step 3: Resolution. G. McCormack.

18. Step 3-Character Selection • Try to limit the children to 2 or 3 main characters. (Helps the children focus) • Make the characters interesting. (Who’s their favourite character in a current book their reading, film they have watched….etc) • Do they know any people they find interesting? (Crazy neighbour) • Have they heard stories of interesting characters? (Henry the VIII) G. McCormack.

19. Step 3-Character Selection • Are they currently reading a text with interesting characters? (Mr Twit) • Try to encourage the children to select characters with different personalities. • Strong personality traits will make the narrative easier to write and will make speech and descriptions of the characters less complicated. G. McCormack.

20. Character Descriptions Ask the children to decide on their characters’ names and imagine what they are like whilst writing down three words to describe them. Examples: • Sue – smart, careful, quiet. • John – Wild, easily lead, rude. • Mr. Johnson – strict, sporty, fair. G. McCormack.

21. Projecting Inferential Understanding. • Encourage the children to show their characters’ personalities through the way they act and they things they say. • This can help a great deal with inferential questioning in comprehension texts based on narratives. Examples: • John announced, “Hey lets skip school and go home. School is boring!” – (John being wild, easily & rude) • “No way!” ordered Sue. “We have so much to learn before university.”- (Sue being smart, careful & quiet) • “What are you two chattering about?” Bellowed Mr. Johnson. “See me at recess so we can discuss your behavior!”– (Mr. Johnson strict, sporty & fair) G. McCormack.

22. Projecting Inferential Understanding. • From these sentences, we can learn a lot about the characters and these should link back to the plan written earlier. • This should help the characters in the narrative stay ‘in Character’ and you should see how their personalities differ. G. McCormack.

23. Planning Progress! By this point the children are already starting to imagine the story in their head and the picture is becoming clearer in their mind. The children should be fully engaged and are anticipating starting to write their story. What the children have so far: • A title (Lost) • A main focus for the narrative (Car Keys) • A setting they have knowledge of (Playground) • Characters with clear Personality traits. (John, Sue & Mr. Johnson) The last section of the planning scheme involves the children imagining the characters within the setting and within the context of the narrative. G. McCormack.

24. Using The Senses Ask the children to imagine themselves in the setting of their choice. They should have some experience of this setting as explained earlier: • Sights – noisy children, sun shining, litter. • Sounds – bells ringing, shouting teachers, jets overhead. • Smells – food, toilets, smelly socks. • Emotions or feelings – Tired, jealous, Unwanted. G. McCormack.

25. Putting It All Together. Ask the children to think about where the complication will begin. For example, where will realise that the keys are lost? Once they have decided, a route can be planned of places they will travel as they move from the beginning of their orientation towards the place where the complicationwill occur and finally the resolution. Lost Keys At School G. McCormack.

26. The Final Plan. Once the route of the orientation has been planned the descriptions of the setting can be inserted at the place they will be seen, heard, smelt, or experienced. The place where the characters will be met can also be inserted. This inspires great thought and discussion. G. McCormack.

27. The finished product G. McCormack.

28. The finished product It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining in the clear blue sky like a bobbing orange in an equatorial sea. As I entered the school I noticed that the door to the boys’ toilets was slightly ajar. I caught a glance of what lay inside and I was disgusted. It looked revolting like a sewer. There were several boys inside chatting and laughing. I wonder why boys always hang around in the toilets? I thought. “Good morning Sue.” I announced as I flicked through my school bag. Sue was my best friend. She was dressed like a principal. She was carrying several books under her left arm and was engrossed in this month’s copy of National Geographic, which was a magazine about nature. Good morning Stephanie how are you?” She mumbled without taking her head from the magazine. “What’s that smell?” she said, as her nose lead her head from her magazine. “It smells like the food from the canteen!” I declared as the smell of the boys toilets was overpowered by the smell of fresh bread coming from the school canteen. I glanced at my watch. It was time to go to class. My eyes felt heavy as I hadn’t slept very well last night. I rubbed them, straightened my tie and entered the classroom. G. McCormack.

29. Questions? G. McCormack.