GCSE English Language 9-1 Picture-Prompted Scaffolded Story Writing - Whole Text Exercise

This is an editable resource but a PDF is included too.

I really enjoyed creating this and it has gone down very well with my students.

Ever tried to teach story writing and been met with a sea of faces staring back blankly? However, when the terminal exam promises the distinct possibility of a story writing task (Paper 1 Question 5) then students must be prepared for this eventuality.

This is one way to encourage students to write good stories which are suitable for GCSE English.

This set of prompts is designed to introduce students to descriptive writing in a number of ways…

The resource is designed as a 60-90 minute class and it focuses on a FULL RESPONSE for a story featuring a different structural feature for each paragraph.

If you want to use exercise books, there is an ‘instruction only’ set here too.

Each paragraph the students must write is accompanied by a number of prompts - both picture-based and written. The prompts indicate what they should write. There is also plenty of time for sharing and class discussions between each paragraph.

So, the first (major) prompts, for example, are:
The opening - a picture of a moody looking teenage boy in a cafe. Students are asked to write about him, including time and place for their first paragraph.
Shift of focus - a picture of a marketplace on a high street. The story shifts to the busy street outside the cafe, busy with people.

…and so on. The story is then further developed with pictures - a “power paragaraph” (one sentence), a shift to describe the interior of the cafe, a flashback when the teenager remembers his ex, a shift to a climax when his ex enters the cafe and finally a cliffhanger.

The prompts then progress, enabling the students to create a complete response which includes all of the skills descriptors for Paper 1 Question 5. Your students should end up with a piece containing a minimum of 7 paragraphs of varying language with structural features and language devices used throughout. There is also an extension task which asks the students to create a word-processed second draft for homework.

This lesson could also be used as a ‘snap’ creative writing session or a cover class. In fact it’s a highly adaptable (and editable!) resource which you can turn to many things.

There is also a ‘five senses’ prompt on the lesson handout, to encourage students to use one or more of these in their writing.

These exercises cover the following Assessment Objectives:

AO5: Communicate clearly, effectively and imaginatively, selecting and adapting tone, style and register for different forms, purposes and audiences. Organise information and ideas, using structural and grammatical features to support coherence and cohesion of texts
AO6: Candidates must use a range of vocabulary and sentence structures for clarity, purpose and effect, with accurate spelling and punctuation.