IGCSE 0500 PAPER 2:
Section A: Writing to persuade
The Three Types of Persuasion
Emotional
(Pathos)
Argument
based on
emotions
and beliefs
Authoritative
(Ethos)
Argument
based on
trust and
authority
Logical
(Logos)
Argument
based on
facts and
reason
Emotional
“Without your support, these pandas have little hope of survival. Would you like to ensure these
majestic creatures survive for your children and grandchildren to see? If so, please give £50
today. It’s not too late to help save pandas from extinction.”
See how the language is very emotive: “majestic creatures” implies something special that
needs to be looked after, which makes us feel responsible. The use of second person makes this
very personal –and forces the reader to feel something.
Authoritative
“The Royal Society of Panda Preservation urges you to act fast. The RSPP has recorded a sharp
decline in numbers and believes the species could die out within a generation. The RSPP asks for
just £50 to help fund its important work.”
The whole basis of this argument is that the PSPP know what they’re talking about; you can
trust what they’re saying because they’re the experts and should be believed. Notice there are
no figures to back up their argument; they don’t really need to as they’re the authority.
Logical
“Recent figures show the panda population has declined by 90% in the last 15 years. It is
forecasted that there will be fewer than 100 pandas living in the wild by 2025. A donation of £50
will pay for further research into ways of conserving the panda population.”
This is a very effective argument because facts don’t lie! The cold, hard figures here speak for
themselves. Obviously, you will want to ask who provided these figures, and whether they be
trusted.
A good argument blends these three techniques
For instance, you can mix authority and logic:
“The RSPP report a 90% decline…”
Or emotional and logical:
“There’ll be fewer than 100 pandas in 10 years; what will you tell your children then..?”
Exam Tip
• Make sure you have a mix of all three modes of persuasive. A purely emotional
argument will seem overly sentimental, a purely logical argument can be quite boring
(and therefore lose its persuasive effect), and an authoritative argument can seem a
bit arrogant and too subjective.
• Adjust the ratio for your audience. E.g., if you’re told to write to a family member, you
may want to focus on more of the emotional argument.
Persuasive Writing: Plan
The Three-Point Plan
THINK
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This question is split between PURPOSE and FORM.
The purpose of the paper is to persuade/argue/discuss. So remember the Persuasive
Writing Theory (ethos/pathos/logos).
The form will be a letter, article or speech. So remember those techniques.
Analyse the question and actively read the insert, just as you would for the Paper 1
Reading exam.
FEEL
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Write down three words that sum up how you feel about the arguments presented in
the text.
DO
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Write a quick table like this:
•
Find 5-6 arguments from the text (4 For, 1 Against / 4 Against, 1 For – depending which
side you’re arguing).
o Sum them up into bullet-points and write them under the corresponding
headers.
o Remember to be aware of the counter-arguments, as that’s what you should
start with.
Focusing only on your side of the argument, label your bullets with the following
argument type:
o E (emotional)
o L (logical)
o A (authoritative)
o This will make sure you have a varied and multi-faceted argument.
•
Exam Tip
• Don’t waste time on writing long narratives in your plan – save that for your answer!
• Stick to bullet-points, or a even just a single word to jog your memory. This plan is for
YOUR benefit, not the examiner’s.
• Also, if you’re unable to sum up your arguments, the examiner won’t be able to either.
Language Techniques
A FOREST
A FOREST:
A Alliteration
F Facts
O Opinions
R Repetition
E Emotive Language
S Statistics
T Three (rule of)
Persuasive Writing: Structure
Persuasive Structure
Write Coherently
Your answer needs to be a coherent piece of writing, not just chunks of good ideas; so you
need to sew your paragraphs together so it reads like one complete piece.
The topic is usually about a CRISIS so a good way to make sure there’s a common thread is to
use language that reflects that.
Use words like “urgent” and “imperative” throughout your answer to get across that sense of
importance.
Another way to make sure your writing is coherent is to have a central motif. Look at the plan
you’ve drafted and think about what motif might represent your argument.
For example, if you’re writing about an injustice, you could use a prison motif to convey a sense
of power imbalance. So you’d use words like “locked”, “punishing”, “imprisoned” etc.
Or if your answer is about some sort of uncertainty you could use a sailing motif. For that, you’d
use nautical language like “navigate” and “turbulent” . You can also use metaphors like “being
at sea” or “in choppy waters”.
Introduction
Think of your introduction as an umbrella; it should cover the whole of your argument and all of
your separate paragraphs. Make sure it’s engaging and gets to the point.
Tip: Don’t start your answer with a vague sentence like “This is a very important issue with lots
of perspectives to consider.” It might be safe and it puts words on the page, but it doesn’t say
anything about your argument.
A Good Structure
1. Start with a bang. Immediately show what side of the argument you’re on. Don’t be too
safe. You can even say that you’re outraged about the topic. You’ll immediately get the
attention of the examiner doing this. If the topic is about a crisis, you can use that word
in your introduction, or even in your first sentence.
2. Now zoom out and set the scene. Give some wider context about the topic. Explain why
it’s an issue in the first place, using information you’ve gleaned from the extract to give
additional detail.
3. Give a personal anecdote. Mention how this issue relates to a personal memory or an
experience; perhaps a holiday or a hobby you have. That way, your passion for the
argument is sincere. It will really help to give your answer some character and
individuality.
Linking Your Paragraphs
Lots of students struggle to get each of their paragraphs started after their introduction. Avoid
using ‘furthermore’ for each paragraph, and try not to ‘list’ your arguments by
“Firstly…Secondly…Thirdly” etc.
Instead, vary the start of your paragraphs:
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o
o
o
Similarly…
Conversely…
However…
Additionally…
Tone of Voice
Write with enthusiasm
Ensure the examiner can hear your voice. Write with a bit of passion, like you really care about
the topic; even if you don’t, you DO care about getting a good grade.
So harness that passion and inject it into your answer so your writing has some spark.
End with confidence
Finish your answer with a powerful sentence related to your argument.
This will ‘wrap up’ your answer and make it look finished, which will tell the examiner you’re in
control of your writing.
Writing an Article
Goal
You need to Argue and debate so the audience is convinced you’re right.
Discuss and weigh-up the conflicting argument so you educate your audience about the issue.
To get what you want,
MAKE THEM THINK
Order of Persuasive Modes
1. Logical
2.
Authoritative
3. Emotional
Layout
This template shows how to lay out an article:
Exam Tip
If the purpose is to discuss/inform, then remember you’re trying to educate the reader about the issue
in the question. There are, generally, two ways of doing this:
DIDACTIC: Comes from the Greek ‘to teach’ – it means giving instructing, particularly a moral one, in a
lecturing-type of way. This style has its place (like when someone of great authority is speaking),
otherwise, it can be quite ‘preachy’ and sometimes a bit patronising and arrogant.
PEDAGOGICAL: This is a more interactive way of educating people. It lets people figure it out for
themselves by asking them questions and inviting to them think. You can interact and engage with
your reader from the other side of the page: ask rhetorical questions, present the arguments
objectively and invite them to draw their own conclusion, rather than spoon-feeding them yours!
Think about how you prefer to learn. Yes, it can sometimes be helpful to have someone bombard you
with information…BUT you probably learn better when it’s more of a two-way process and you’re
engaged with the person teaching you.
“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”
Oscar Wilde
“You should write, write, write every day, and learn to edit and pare it right back so you’re proud of every sentence, and
each one is either useful or beautiful, but hopefully both.”
Caitlin Moran
Writing a Letter
Goal
You need to Persuade and appeal to the reader for them to give you what you want
To get what you want,
MAKE THEM BELIEVE
Order of Persuasive Modes
1. Logical
2.
Authoritative
3. Emotional
Layout
This template shows how to lay out a letter.
*IMPORTANT* if the question tells you to start your letter “Dear [name]…” then you DON’T need to write out the
addresses and dates.
You should always start your letter with Dear, followed by their name, e.g. “Dear George” or “Dear Mrs Bennett”. If you
don’t know their name, you can either write “Dear Sir/Madam” or you can address it to their job title, e.g. “Dear
Headmistress”.
When you sign off your letter, you can end with “yours sincerely” if you do know their name, and “yours faithfully” when
you don’t know their name.
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One way to remember this rule is:
Be FAITHFUL to people you DON’T know
Sin AGAINST people you DO know
—
If it’s an informal letter – to a family member or friend – you can sign off with simply “Yours” or “Best wishes” or “Love”,
if you’re very close.
Dos and Don’ts
✓ DO
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Address the recipience by name wherever possible
Use different paragraph lengths to keep the layout and rhythm of your letter interesting,
Charm your examiner; get them to like you. The best way to do this is with some humour, so add the occasional joke or
mild hyperbole for effect. Compliments are also very welcome, something like “p.s. I loved the shoes you were wearing
last time we met!” – that added detail will make the examiner smile, which will always work in your favour!
✘ DON’T
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Start with “I’m writing because” – teachers and examiners really hate it (it’s a bit lazy, and it’s what lower-grade
students do). Instead, open your letter gently: e.g. “It was lovely seeing you last week…”
Use colloquial (casual) language or words you’d normally use with friends (like “fleak”)
Use short-form, e.g. write out “do not” instead of don’t (to make it more formal)
Use a vocabulary you’re not comfortable; being formal doesn’t always mean old fashioned. You can still use
contemporary language.
“Switching from talking to writing is like getting ready for a night out. You’re not putting on fancy dress, or trying to
look like someone else; you’re going as yourself, but making more effort, being a bit smarter, getting closer to your best.”
– Tim de Lisle, Writer and Journalist
Writing a Speech
Goal
You need to argue and debate so the audience are convinced you’re right
To get what you want,
MAKE THEM FEEL
Order of Persuasive Modes
1. Emotional
2. Logical
3.
Authoritative
Layout
A speech is much more about content than style. It is meant to be spoken rather than written, so it’s more of a script.
There’s no special layout like an article or letter; the focus here is more on your language techniques. You should try and
include all the persuasive writing language techniques:
A FOREST:
A Alliteration
F Facts
O Opinions
R Repetition
E Emotive Language
S Statistics
T Three (rule of)
Exam Tip
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Write like you talk. Your speech should read like a transcript, rather than an essay.
When you practice, try using a text-to-speech dictation App and speak out your answer once you have a written
plan.
Then look at how the text looks on paper and literally see what your speech looks like.
“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them
feel.”
Maya Angelou
Section B: Writing to Describe
Describe: The Basics
Create a Visualization for the Reader
Be Detailed
Create an image for your reader
Writing to describe is a bit like explaining a picture or a film-clip. You need to re-create that image, only
using words, so that the person reading your description has an almost exact replica of that image in
their head afterwards. It’s a bit like telepathy! The important thing to remember is to be detailed.
Take this picture, for example. Imagine you need to explain what this looks like to someone who can’t
see it, and they want to know exactly what it looks like. The trick is in the DETAIL. You need to be very,
very specific about your description.
If you’re not specific, they’re going to be missing crucial elements and the image they have in their head
will be very different to what you intend.
You want to describe the first picture, but if you’re not careful, your reader will end up with the second
one.
Things to Remember
Let your reader see what you see
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Descriptive writing isn’t literary fiction.
You’re not telling a story. That’s the ‘narrative’ part of Section B.
All you’re doing is creating a visualization for the reader using language.
“Everything is complicated if no one explains it to you.”
Fredrik Backman
Word Classes
How to Write Detailed Descriptions
Core Word Classes
So how to write these detailed descriptions that you need for the exam? The best place to start is with
your core word classes, which are:
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Adjectives
Nouns
Verbs
Adverbs
Use Adjectives
Size, shape and colour can be a good start , so try and use 1-2 adjectives before the noun.
For example….
“Here’s is an apple”. That does the job – but there’s nothing distinctive about that description. So be
more detailed by adding a couple of adjectives. Make it a “large, green apple”.
That’s getting there, but it’s still a bit vague. So let’s add more detail, this time to a hairbrush:
“A medium-sized, round, red hairbrush with several rows of bristles.”
This detail gives the reader a much clearer image of your object. But it sounds a little forensic – almost
like a piece of evidence at a crime scene. So we need to bring our descriptions to life a bit more….
Try to make your objects slightly extraordinary or unusual.
So perhaps your apple is “misshapen and battered, with a bruise on one side”.
Here are some more examples of how to use adjectives.
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She was wearing red shoes = ruby-red ballet-style shoes without a heel.
He was wearing a tie = blue and pink polka-dot tie that was slightly too tight.
She took out a cookie = chocolate-chip cookie slightly larger than the palm of her hand.
Exam Tip
You can add these adjectives after you’ve finished, when you’re checking your work and want to inject a
bit more detail.
Specify Your Nouns
Be as specific as you can with your objects.
Tell the reader what type of apple you’re describing: is it a Granny Smith, or a Pink Lady or an uncooked
baking apple?
If you’re describing a scene with a dog in it, specify what type of breed: perhaps a small, overweight pug.
It’s these extra details that show your examiner that you have some imagination, but also that you also
are aware of cultural details around you.
Upgrade Your Verbs & Adverbs
If someone is walking in your scene, think about HOW they’re walking, but also WHY they’re walking in
the first place.
So are they’re strolling because it’s a casual walk, or are they creeping because they don’t want to get
caught doing something? Is someone sauntering because they have a bit of an attitude? There are lots
of different ways of walking so you should specify the exact manner because it will give a much clearer
and more nuanced image, plus it adds extra connotations to your writing.
When they’re deliberate, and you’ve added them for effect, connotations make your writing more
sophisticated because they influence the emotions going on; they can make the scene more uplifting or
eerie or sombre etc.
This also makes your writing more suspenseful and dramatic, and can add much more depth by creating
an atmosphere which can enhance or foreshadow some drama that’s about to happen:
“She meandered in the hallway a while – slightly unsteadily – before creeping up the second flight of
stairs.”
Obviously the writer could have just said “She walked around in the hallway before she went upstairs.”
But the words “meander” and “creep” have slightly ominous connotations so immediately our reader
knows something sinister might be about to happen. All because we’ve carefully chosen the precise
verbs to suit the scene.
Finally, the other detail in that example which gives it its ominous effect is the adverb unsteadily, which
shows how also enhancing your adverbs helps to increase the level of detail in your writing.
Here are some examples of some adverbs you can use:
Helplessly
Nervously
Passionately Boldly
Absently
Coolly
Guiltily
Viciously
Energetically Stealthily
Knowingly
Queasily
Rudely
Sedately
Solemnly
Reluctantly
Righteously
Shrilly
Silently
Respectfully
Righteously
Coolly
Passionately
Think about the connotations of each of these words, and how they might change the emotions of a
sentence.
There are obviously hundreds of others you can use! But this short list should give you an idea about
how much more exciting and realistic your writing can be.
Immerse the Reader
Appeal to the Senses
Use of Imagery
See
Hear
Smell
Taste
Touch
& Personification
Visual
Appeal to the reader’s sense of sight so they can imagine what the scene looks like.
For instance:
“After years of heavy smoking, the once-white walls in her living room were now the colour of a torched
crem-brulee.”
As long as the reader knows what crème brulee looks like, they now have a very accurate description of
how the living room walls appear.
Auditory
Write for the reader’s hearing senses so they can imagine what sounds are going on.
“George woke to the sound of his Labrador barking, deep and loud, repeatedly and angrily, at the
neighbour’s cat standing on the opposite side of the window.”
It helps us imagine the sound now we know its pitch and volume.
Be aware: onomatopoeia can be effective – perhaps a burst tyre can hiss or blood can gargle – but don’t
use it gratuitously – only if it adds extra detail to your description.
Olfactory
Think about what scents and smells are going on. You can even cause a physical reaction with this one!
Particularly if you’re describing food because you can get the reader’s mouth to water. For instance:
“As I lifted my slice of pizza from the box, that rich, creamy smell of four melted cheeses – together with
the sweet, sticky smell of buffalo-chicken – sent my tastebuds gushing.”
Adding some detail about the smells in the scene helps place the reader there and makes it much more
realistic.
Gustatory
If the person in your description is eating, what tastes can you describe?
For instance:
“The roasted hazelnut mixed with the flavour of dark chocolate. It was sweet, and bitter, with a slight
aftertaste of wood – that same taste you get when you bite the top of a pencil.”
Be creative, using your own experiences to help express your ideas.
Tactile
What do the objects in your scene feel like? Is the blanket someone’s sat on slightly itchy and course; is
the ticket they’re holding slightly waxy; is the snowball they’re holding so cold that it feels numb to
begin with, then turns slightly wet, and suddenly it feel like hundreds of needles are going into their skin
as the cold sets in? We’ve all felt these sensations, so almost everyone can relate to these feelings.
Another example here:
“I was expecting it to be wet and slimy, but as the snake moved on my palm it was surprisingly dry and
incredibly smooth – like a well-polished wooden banister.”
Personification
You can also immerse your reader by using personification to bring some of these senses to life a bit
more.
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The wheels screamed
The trees trembled
The dog danced enthusiastically
The fire swallowed the whole building
The mountains bullied and intimidated the valley underneath
You could even make your landscape an extra ‘character’ in your description.
Here’s an example by Emily Dickenson to show how effective that can be:
“When it comes, the landscape listens,
Shadows hold their breath,”
Show Don’t Tell
Making Comparisons
Size & Weight
If you’re trying to convey just how loud, fast, large or small something is, try to compare it to something
the reader can easily imagine.
For example,
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A spider is as large as the base of a baked bean can.
When the cat was lying down it was roughly the length of a cricket bat.
The baby she was holding was about the size and weight of a watermelon
These comparisons really help the reader “see” and “feel” the size and weight of what you’re trying to
describe. Most things – whether it’s a spider, cat or baby – can vary hugely in size. So it helps the reader
to have a more accurate image if you compare it to something that doesn’t vary in shape and size all
that much.
Unusual Similes
Try and make your similes slightly unusual, or incongruous. Your writing will be much more fun and
interesting if you use some creative juxtaposition and hyperbole.
For example:
“The battered old briefcase was placed on the desk. Its scuffed brown leather looked like the skin of an
old sunbather and, as she placed it on the clear glass, she thought how it looked like an ancient artefact
being taken out for inspection.”
The comparison of the leather to sun-damaged skin helps to convey the detail of the colour and texture
of the case, while the contrasts between the old and new (the glass Vs the briefcase, the sunbather Vs
the woman etc) help the reader to create a clear image of the scene.
Incongruous comparisons help to set a tone, usually of intrigue. When you’re revising, try to practice
being deliberately incongruous by contrasting things in your descriptions that woludn’t normally go
together.
Oxymorons and paradoxes can also be very effective tools:
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The silence was deafening.
He was an honest thief.
It was beautifully ugly.
Exam Tip
Avoid clichés or your writing will become predicatable and boring. Instead, show the
examiner you’re an independent thinker and that you can write with originality.
Here are some examples of clichés that are sure to turn your examiner off:
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Frightened to death
Quiet before the storm
Old as the hills
Fit as a fiddle
Nerves of steel
Creating a Semantic Field
“As the train hurtled towards the station at full speed, the brakes screamed desperately – the sound of
a Prima Donna about to smash a bulb with her voice. Hot smoke billowed as the friction heated up,
releasing the smell of burning rubber. The train alarm sounds – a deafening whistle like a thousand
kettles sounding at once – before carriages knock into themselves so that the train becomes a giant
mechanical caterpillar, curling up as it makes its way forward.”
You’ll notice in this example a semantic field of panic and alarm, created by the words: scream, smash,
heated, burning. It’s an appropriate semantic field, given the context of a train crash. So when you
create a semantic field, think about what mood you want to create. How do you want the reader to
feel?
happy / melancholic / nostalgic / sombre etc?
Make sure you pick the right connotations from your word class choices to create the right mood and
atmosphere.
A good acronym to remember these techniques is POSH JAM
Personification
Oxymoron/Onomatopoeia
Simile
Hyperbole
Juxtaposition
Adjectives
Metaphor
Section B: Writing to Narrate
Narrate: The Basics
Prepare to be Creative
A Bank of Ideas
For a lot of students, this is the fun part of the exam and where you can get creative. But that doesn’t
mean you don’t need to study for it! It just means you need to prepare rather than revise.
There are lots of tricks you can learn to help bring out your creativity, and that doesn’t mean being
spontaneous. In fact, the first rule for this question is not to create new ideas in the exam.
Instead, give yourself a head start by having a bank of ideas ready to go into the exam with. So when
you’re preparing for this section, develop ideas for:
Five objects
Five characters
Five settings
Ideas Generator: Objects
In order to get those objects, we need to generate some ideas.
So start with a central image – a suitcase always works well – they’re very versatile and fit into most
settings, and operate as a good springboard for your story. If the question is for you to write a story set
on a train, you can zoom in on your suitcase – let’s say, your old, battered-looking, well-travelled
suitcase – and start your story there.
Perhaps this case has been left by somebody? What’s in it? A bomb? Some old books, clothes, gold?
Equally, of course, that object could be a brown paper bag or an umbrella, a dirty wine glass or some
spectacles, a torn up photo or a child’s toy.
You can use one or more of these objects in your scene to add that important detail, or to inspire an
entire narrative.
Ideas Generator: Characters
Now get a loose idea of some people to bring into your story – we can think about their personality
traits later on:
For example, my characters are:
An old woman
A young boy
A busy woman
An old man
A trendy dad
You should only need to focus on one or two or your characters in the exam, but like your objects – and
everything you need to study for in fact – it’s good to be prepared with a few extra.
Now if you’re struggling to come up with your own ideas, just head to Google Images and search for,
say, an old man – pick one you like and give him a name.
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You can also get inspiration when you’re in a café, on a train journey or from social media.
You could base a character loosely on somebody you know.
Wherever you are, look around you for inspiration.
Putting Them All Together
Now you can start putting your people and objects together. For example:
“An old man sat by the window wiping his glasses.”
“The young boy was falling asleep and slowly losing his grip on his teddy’s paws.”
“The woman stopped typing then looked out the window and smiled. The boy noticed and gently kicked
her chair so she’d smile at him, too.”
We’re now part way there to developing a story. So if the question asks you to write a story about a
character who is new to the area, think about which of your characters would best fit the scene, then
decide what objects they have on them when you first introduce them to the reader.
Setting
Creating a Setting
Immerse Your Reader in the Setting
There will usually be a question specifying the setting. For instance, it will ask you to write a story in a
busy train station. That’s where you decide which of your objects and characters you want to bring in.
If you are given the setting, then think about what senses are going on. This helps to immerse your
reader and brings your scene to life a lot more. It involves a lot of the skills covered in the Writing to
Describe pages. So you’ll know that when you specify the senses being stimulated in the scene, it helps
set a mood for your writing.
Using the Senses for a Setting
Here’s a really good example of creating a mood for your setting from Margaret Atwood’s novel ‘The
Testaments’ – it’s taken from a scene where a girl realises her mother is seriously unwell.
“Her room no longer smelt like her – that light, sweet smell, like the lily-flowered Hostas in our garden –
but as if a stale, dirtied stranger had crept in and was hiding under the bed.”
The smells there are familiar to us – even if we don’t know what Hostas are, we generally know what
flowers smell like. So the contrast between that familiar and pleasant smell against the stench of a stale,
dirty stranger, is really effective to emphasise an unwelcome atmosphere of sickness and pending
danger.
But the smells also say a lot about the characters in a small number of words: the ‘light, sweet smell’
shows how delicate and feminine the mother is, and the astuteness of the girl to recognise all that
shows her intelligence and sensitivity – and how close their relationship must be.
Senses can be a really good place to start your story as well.
For example, “The smell reminded me of…” throws the reader straight in and creates some intrigue.
Even more so if you add some contrast and juxtapose the sense to the setting:
“The smell reminded me of my step-mother smoking at the breakfast table.”
Firstly, we don’t expect someone to be smoking at the breakfast table, so we start making some flash
assumptions about the characters, which may or may not turn out to be true. We’re intrigued by these
two characters and whatever story is going between them, all because of a smell that wouldn’t normally
fit the setting.
Ideas Generator: Settings
Sometimes in the exam you’ll be given a sense to write about and the setting will be up to you. For
instance the question might ask you to write a story starting with “There was complete silence…”.
Well where is that silence? And that’s for you to decide.
Here’s where it’ll help for you to have some ‘Setting’ ideas up your sleeve. So mine are:
A wooded forest
A crowded beach
Inside an elevator
A wedding reception
Inside a car
On the surface, it might not look like there can be silence on a busy beach or in a car. But again that
contrast and incongruity makes for a really interesting plot. So perhaps the beach has gone silent
because there’s an eclipse happening or the music’s stopped at a wedding because someone is about to
make a dramatic announcement.
It helps if you have 1 or 2 generic spaces like an elevator or car because you can easily adapt them to fit
most questions.
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It’s generally a good idea to stick to what you know with your settings.
If you’ve never been to a wedding or a funeral before, maybe avoid writing about those as
there’ll be lots of details you won’t know about.
Having said that, if you get a question set at a wedding and you don’t like the other question
options, then practice ways to get around it – could the weeding be on the beach or in your
family’s garden?
Enclosed spaces tend to be really fertile ground for creative writing too because the atmosphere
can be intense.
Plot
Creating a Plot
The Narrative Arc
The plot for pretty much every story ever told follows the same narrative arch. A very basic formula that
consists of three phases:
4. Normality – everything’s going OK and people are going about their every-day lives.
5. Disruption – there’s been some drama or an event where normality get turned upside down.
6. New Normal – things have settled down and, while they’ve not gone back to exactly how they
were before, a new normality has been established.
The technical term for these phases is:
Equilibrium -> Disequilibrium -> New equilibrium
You don’t need to know these terms for the exam, but it does sometimes help students to remember
the narrative arc when they know the proper terms.
And that’s it! That’s the magic formula for creating a story. Think about any of your favourite films or
books or plays; they’ll always follow this three-phase formula.
Start in the Middle
But often stories start in the middle, at the point of disequilibrium, where we’re thrown into the story
during the crisis or straight after. So we might get introduced to a character stranded on an island, for
instance, and we’ll have no idea why they’re there. Or a plane has crashed in the jungle and we won’t
know what’s happened.
We’ll usually then be given a flashback to before the event, so that we know what that character’s
equilibrium looked like and the events that led up to the disruption.
Then after that, once we care about the character and know their backstory, we’ll want to see what
happens next for them – what their new equilibrium looks like, and how they’ve been changed by the
experience.
This method can be a really intriguing way to start your story.
Plot Development
Your three-phase narrative arc doesn’t always need to involve a dramatic event; sometimes the
disequilibrium of a story can be quite subtle. Sometimes the disequilibrium can be a petty argument.
This is where a story is more character-based rather than plot-based, and the story is more about the
maturing of a person or a relationship, so the change taking place is more emotional and psychological,
rather than any big external event.
That’s particularly true for a coming-of-age story or a romance plot.
Transformations
You can also transform your setting to follow the narrative arc. Twilight works very well for that: either
going from day to night or night to day – that way, the change in your setting mirrors your plot, which
can also allow for some pathetic fallacy.
Exam Tip
Make sure your tenses are consistent. Ask yourself if the action is taking place in the past, present or
future. Just because your scene is transforming to night, that doesn’t mean you switch to future tense!
If the action is still occurring in the present, stick to present tense.
Just make sure you don’t chop and change tenses for no reason.
Parallel & Intertwined Narratives
Once you’re confident practicing different plots, you can start to intertwine narratives. For example,
perhaps your story starts on a boat and they discover a plane wreck. Or perhaps you have two
characters in separate cars and their lives come together some how.
Do the two cars crash? Do they pull up to traffic lights and they recognise each other?
Writing can be really entertaining when we’re offered different perspectives and there’s a plot twist
like that – it shows the writer is ahead of the reader.
The Ending
It’s sometimes better to leave the ending open and let the examiner interpret it however they like. You
don’t even need to know how your story ends! That’s sometimes the beauty of a great story, that the
ending is very personal to the reader when it’s left to their own imagination.
That’s a great way to make sure the examiner LOVES your story.
Exam Tip
Remember you only need to write 350-450 words for this section – you’re not expected to write the new
Harry Potter!