Starter quiz
- What are the purposes of the opening of a narrative?
- to build up tension
- to engage the reader so that they want to carry on reading ✓
- to entertain the reader with lots of characters' spoken words
- to introduce the setting and characters ✓
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- Put the four key moments of the opening in chronological order.
- 1⇔Dusk approached the dark, magical woods.
- 2⇔Strange, unknown creatures moved around the woods.
- 3⇔A father warned his son about the dangers of the creatures.
- 4⇔The boy felt scared, but he bravely entered the woods.
- What is a simple sentence?
- a sentence made of just one main clause ✓
- a sentence with two main clauses and a co-ordinating conjunction
- a sentence with a subordinating conjunction
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- What is a compound sentence?
- a sentence formed of two main clauses
- a sentence formed of two main clauses joined by a co-ordinating conjunction ✓
- a sentence formed of two main clauses joined by a subordinating conjunction
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- Which of the following are true about dialogue?
- It gives factual information.
- It is the written conversation between two characters in a narrative. ✓
- It tells the reader when something happened.
- It helps move the story forward. ✓
- It describes a verb in further detail.
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- Writers start a new ______ to signal the start of a new idea or key moment.
- 'paragraph' ✓
Exit quiz
- The __________ is the first section of a story where the writer describes the setting and main characters.
- opening ✓
- build-up
- climax
- resolution
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- True or false? 'A complex sentence is a sentence consisting of a main clause and a subordinate clause.'
- True ✓
- False
- What is the name of the punctuation mark that indicates where the words the character said begin and end?
- comma
- inverted commas ✓
- question mark
- exclamation mark
- full stop
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- Which direct speech sentence is correctly punctuated?
- ‘‘Beware of the brutal, savage Jabberwock warned the concerned father.
- ‘‘Beware of the brutal, savage Jabberwock,’’ warned the concerned father. ✓
- Beware of the brutal, savage Jabberwock warned the concerned father.
- ‘‘Beware of the brutal, savage Jabberwock’’ warned the concerned father.
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- Which sentence is correctly punctuated?
- In, the shadows, strange creatures were wriggling and writhing.
- In the shadows strange creatures were wriggling and writhing.
- In the shadows strange, creatures were wriggling and writhing.
- In the shadows, strange creatures were wriggling and writhing. ✓
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- Which of these relative complex sentences is punctuated correctly?
- The young boy who was listening intently, began to tremble nervously.
- The young boy, who was listening intently, began to tremble nervously. ✓
- The young boy who was listening intently began to tremble nervously.
- The young boy, who was listening intently began to tremble, nervously.
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Worksheet
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Presentation
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Lesson Details
Key learning points
- The purpose of the opening is to engage the reader and introduce the setting and characters.
- Using a range of sentence types (simple, compound and complex) improves text flow for the reader.
- Direct speech is punctuated using inverted commas; dialogue moves the action forward.
- Notes from the plan can be used to form full sentences.
- A new paragraph is used to signal the start of a new idea or key moment.
Common misconception
Pupils may struggle with using accurate punctuation in direct speech sentences.
Give pupils an opportunity to practise writing speech on mini-whiteboards and provide a visual scaffold to support them.
Keywords
Text flow - how a text is written to keep the reader engaged
Fronted adverbial - a sentence starter followed by a comma
Relative clause - a type of subordinate clause that starts with a relative pronoun
Direct speech - shows that a character is speaking out loud in a text
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