Teachit trail
The original writing trail:
http://www.teachit.co.uk/index.asp?currmenu=2 84
Starter activities
(can double as plenaries):
Notes or comments
Put muscle into your writing
Task sheet in which students consider and use a
variety of active verbs.
Varying your sentences
Students familiarise themselves with different sentence
types and practise using them.
Sentence lengths and interesting
vocabulary
The class reads an extract and comments on impact of
sentence lengths and types.
Exploring effects with sentences (Syntex)
Experiment with making sentences more effective with
Syntex.
Narrative structure matching activity
Students match the different types of narrative structure
to the definition. Brilliant as a card sort or IWB activity.
Preparing for narrative writing
Complete with a Tweakit, this encourages students to
look at structure. Also includes a graph to show the
rise and fall of tension.
Creating a setting
Helpful pointers for successful creative writing – ideal
for display on whiteboard.
Ideas / the planning stage:
There’s more to original writing than just
writing stories
Ideas for encouraging a creative response. Students
think outside the box!
Creative writing task
Students create a piece of original writing using the ‘mix
‘n’ match’ elements.
Original writing tips and suggestions
Collected wisdom taken from several different original
writing staffroom threads.
The writing stage:
Describing a beach or holiday memory
Great Key Stage 3 descriptive writing task.
Writing a short story
Complete with a Tweakit, this resource contains a
recipe for writing a short story.
Wild week creative story writing – a booklet
(Project task). Students are presented with a series of
strange and magical incidents. Their task – to produce
a creative response.
Tips, tick lists and AFL strategies
Writing checklists
See pages 1, 3 and 4 for a list of key ingredients for
descriptive and original writing.
Original writing – things to remember!
A GCSE PowerPoint containing useful tips
Teachit trails are mini-schemes which plot a pathway through a site or curriculum area. Each trail comes complete with a ‘trail map’
containing an at a glance list of useful Teachit resources, and a more comprehensive ‘trail guide’ with suggestions, tips and topic specific
advice. For access to other Teachit Trails, go to: http://www.teachit.co.uk/trails.
© 2007 www.teachit.co.uk
8555
Page 1 of 3
Original writing trail
This trail incorporates a range of original writing tasks and approaches so that you can pick
and choose your activities according to the key stage or exact needs of a group/individual.
The selected resources range from specific tasks on sentences and vocabulary, to more
wide ranging activities or ideas geared towards getting your students’ creative juices flowing.
Getting going
Put muscle into your writing by using strong verbs. This is a good, rowdy starter in which students are
encouraged to think about specific verb choices and act them out. Then it’s onto the nitty gritty of
replacing the verbs with their own selections. Stretch this resource by getting students to take a
ploddy passage from a text and jazz it up. (The Curious Incident of a Dog in the Night-time might
provide you with some simple text to play around with.) http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/curious/
For another ‘brass tacks’ starter, have a look at Varying your sentences. This resource capitalises on
the old ‘cat sat on the mat’ sentence and takes students through various sentence types. The
extension task gets students to create their own sentences and find and label some gruesome
examples from Pat Barker’s Regeneration.
Sentence lengths and interesting vocabulary is a versatile resource. Use it as a stand-alone
homework task or cover lesson, or get students into groups/pairs and have them produce some
shared writing. Extend by getting students to finish the story or challenge them to write a piece of
flash fiction in which they must re-tell the story in no more than 50 words. (Refer to back editions of
Mslexia magazine or http://www.fishpublishing.com/ for examples of good flash fiction.)
For a good whizzy stand alone or speaking and listening starter, try Magnet activity – bag of tricks.
Use the list of objects to inspire creative writing or original speaking and listening. Click the
Information button on the resource for activity ideas.
Exploring effects with sentences. This Syntex activity is a great way for students to experiment with
making sentences more effective. Students need to sequence the words and add the correct
punctuation. Detailed instructions are available in the accompanying PDF file.
If you want a good way to introduce students to narrative structure, try the Narrative structure
matching activity. Cut out the cards or go whizzy with the Flash matching activity. Adapt this for a
library lesson by getting your students to categorise various texts according to structure, or find their
own examples of books that are structured in an interesting or unusual way.
Preparing for narrative writing comes complete with a Tweakit and contains some lovely ideas for
screenplays and novelisations. Great as a Media/Drama tie in, you could focus on the pluses and
minuses of each (‘What does the book have that the story doesn’t?’ and vice versa.)
For a simple, useful, one page set of ‘reminders’ use Creating a setting for students to refer to during
the writing process. In terms of ideas for the task in question, you could get students to bring in their
own photographs, get out and about with a camera or download an atmospheric scene from
www.flickr.com.
Ideas / the planning stage:
If you’ve got a class of ‘rush at it’ students and want to slow them down and draw attention to
planning, then have a look at There’s more to original writing than just writing stories which lists a
number of creative approaches to choose from and gives students ownership of their writing. The
planning box means that students have to think before they leap.
Creative writing task would be ideal for a higher set or gifted group of students as it leaves things
nicely open. It’s a simple one page sheet in which students mix and match the various ‘elements’ and
come up with some ideas for a poem, short story or piece of descriptive writing. There’s plenty of
scope for you to amend/stamp your individual mark on things and this resource will ensure that you
don’t straightjacket your students or get 30 identikit responses that will reduce you to tears.
Teachit trails are mini-schemes which plot a pathway through a site or curriculum area. Each trail comes complete with a ‘trail map’
containing an at a glance list of useful Teachit resources, and a more comprehensive ‘trail guide’ with suggestions, tips and topic specific
advice. For access to other Teachit Trails, go to: www.teachit.co.uk/trails.
© 2007 www.teachit.co.uk
8555
Page 2 of 3
Original writing trail
Original writing suggestions. This is a collection of ideas and teachers’ tips taken from several
different staffroom threads on the topic. It’s a great place to start if you’re looking for GCSE
coursework inspiration.
The writing stage:
Describing a beach or holiday memory. A lovely descriptive writing resource based around re-creating
a holiday memory (ideal for Key Stage 3). It uses snippets from Dylan Thomas’ ‘Holiday Memory’ and
incorporates some marvellous, moody, seaside photographs. This could be extended to form a piece
of travel writing or adapted and tweaked for Key Stage 4.
Writing a short story comes complete with a Tweakit and supplies students with a recipe for writing –
page 1 in particular, is useful for helping students hone/focus on their planning.
Wild week creative story writing – a booklet (ideal for KS3) presenting students with a series of strange
and magical incidents guaranteed to inspire creative responses.
Tips, tick lists and AFL strategies
Writing checklists – a set of handy checklists for a range of writing approaches. Ideal for incorporating
AFL into your lessons.
Original writing – things to remember! A fantastically handy PowerPoint this (ideal for use before
students begin writing or after the completion of a first draft). Walk your class through the down-toearth advice on structuring sentences, putting paragraphs together and using vocabulary effectively.
Still more…
English teaching online – the one with all the original writing. Some great advice from published
writers including David Almond and Darren Shan:
http://www.teachit.co.uk/custom_content/newsletters/newsletter_sep06.asp
Teachit trails are mini-schemes which plot a pathway through a site or curriculum area. Each trail comes complete with a ‘trail map’
containing an at a glance list of useful Teachit resources, and a more comprehensive ‘trail guide’ with suggestions, tips and topic specific
advice. For access to other Teachit Trails, go to: www.teachit.co.uk/trails.
© 2007 www.teachit.co.uk
8555
Page 3 of 3