ENE9 Australian Experience
Checkpoint Planner Short Story
Name
Mia Nardone
Follow this Checkpoint Planner to plan your own short story
Key Questions
Planning Answers
1
What experience does the story focus on? (<10 words)
2
3
4
5
When is it set / when did it happen?
Where is it set / where did it happen?
Characters in it? (only have a few characters)
Why is the experience particularly ‘Australian’?
6
What is the “human experience” to be highlighted?
7
List the story’s ‘Australian’ …
These will be
 Aspects of the land
 Events that are ‘Aussie’
 Peculiarities of Australia
 Observations about us,
our culture & history
 Settings and location
My story focuses on the removal policy of the 1950’s where many young natives to Australia were
taken and put into concentration camps to be converted into the British colonisers manners and
lifestyles.
1950’s – During the Aboriginal removal policy
Set in a concentration camp out in Rural Queensland
Jarrah, Alinta, Concentration camp matron, other little girls
Many Aboriginal people native to the land were treated horribly and taken away from their
homelands to be converted into “White people”. Although not all “Australians” experienced this,
it’s the sad truth for many natives to Australia.
The magnificent coral reef made Jarrah truly realise she felt at home when she was with Alinta.
Ever since that day, Jarrah has aspired to be as beautiful as the ocean because she believed the
ocean was the most powerful and feminine thing in the world, and those two attributes are what
define the ocean as ‘the ocean’. The ocean was where she knew she belonged.
… Elements
Location
Event
Character speech
Wildlife
Attitudes
Issues & topics
Incidental observations
Short Story Narrative Tension Graph
Start
‘In Medias Res’
Journey
Challenge or task
Start in the middle
What will be
of some action THEN achieved to give a
backfill details
sense of “wow”?
Build Tension /
Move to Climax
Build Tension /
Move to Climax
Build Tension /
Move to Climax
Climax / Highpoint
Bit by bit, move the
story to the ending, a
new event each time
Bit by bit, move the
story to the ending, a
new event each time
Bit by bit, move the
story to the ending, a
new event each time
The journey/ task /
challenge is solved
completed/ overcome
Resolution
The character/s
learn/ grow from
this experience