Monday 27th April 2020 The Problem

It’s now your turn to be an author. This week you will be writing your version of ‘The Game’ by changing parts of the story to your own original ideas. Let’s look at the problem section of our text ‘The Game’.

The problem: At that moment, the table began to shake, then the windows rattled and the floor vibrated. Everyone stopped what they were doing and the room fell silent. “EARTHQUAKE!” shouted Billy, bursting into laughter. He soon stopped, as in a blink of an eye, an enormous spider, bigger than a horse, shot out of the game and landed in the centre of the crowded classroom. Everyone froze. Its enormous, hairy legs were tensed, ready to pounce and its whole body seemed to pulse. Eight bulging eyes scanned the room and then... It sprung into action. It crushed the tables, smashed the windows and flung children all around the classroom with a flick of its legs. It powered towards Mrs Allbright as she stood rooted to the floor in terror. The room was filled with shrieks of panic and despair. “What shall we do?” shouted Danny desperately, pressing himself tightly against the wall. “Read the instructions,” ordered Sally, “We have to stop it!”

The problem is, here the game has become reality and the games pieces have started to become real-life animals-in this case the tarantula.

Discussion What other insects/animals could out of the game? This would be a simple way to change the story.

What else could come out of the game? This would require a little more creativity. What other problems could the game cause? This is a really good way to challenge your creativity.

Today we will keep the classroom setting the same for now. First, make notes or draw what will come out of the game in your story and what it will do once it’s released. You could record like this:

Now in your books you will begin to write your problem section. Let’s look again at the beginning of the problem: ‘At that moment, the table began to shake, then the windows rattled and the floor vibrated. Everyone stopped what they were doing and the room fell silent.’

The author has used ‘sentence of three’ here to describe the strange events. We looked at this on Friday.

Look back at your ideas for this or see if you can come up with some new ones to write the problem. Then, on a new page in your books, write how the children react. If you are finding this tricky use the text to help you and a thesaurus to find synonyms for some words. For an extra challenge think of your own reactions.

📝 At that moment...

Next the author introduces the threat: In a blink of an eye, an enormous spider, as big as a horse, shot out of the game and landed in the centre of the crowded classroom. Everyone froze. Its enormous, hairy legs were tensed, ready to pounce and its whole body seemed to pulse. Eight bulging eyes scanned the room and then ...

You will introduce your new threat. Look back over your table of ideas and put it into sentences. Remember to explain where it has come from and describe what it looks like.

📝 In the blink of an eye, ...

Tuesday 28th April 2020 The Setting

Today we will experiment with changing the setting for ‘The Game’. Change the classroom setting to somewhere different. Where else could this happen?

Plan a new idea. You could make notes or draw in a table form like this:

On a new page in your books you will write your new problem in a different setting. You will start as before with the first strange event, then introduce the new threat and then finally describe what the threat does. 📝

Wednesday 29th April 2020 Planning the Story

Today we will be boxing up our finding tale to plan a whole new story. You can be as creative as you like. You can change the setting to somewhere other than a school or even change that a board game was involved. You could even write a new story about what happens next...when Billy opens the game next wet play.

Now you have got lots of ideas down it’s time to decide! Go through your ideas and writing over the last two weeks and pick the finalised ideas as a whole story plan. You can record it in a table like this:

Remember to add your best; • adjectives • verbs • sentence of three • To challenge yourself add an embedded relative clause.

(These are the ‘success criteria’)

Thursday 30th April 2020 Writing your finding tale

Today we are finally ready to write our story. Remember, just like in school, you should always use; your plan, your previous writing and check every sentence for punctuation.

What punctuation should we check for? Tell an adult...

• Capital letter (At the start and for proper nouns) • Fullstops • Inverted commas for character speech • Commas in your embedded clauses

📝 Ok, off you go. Remember say a bit, write a bit, read a bit, write a bit more! Check, check, check! 👌 🙂

Ask an adult or an older sibling to have a quick check afterwards and we will edit and improve tomorrow!

Friday 1st May 2020 Self Assess and Publish

Well done on writing your new finding tale! Now, just as we do in school the final part of our writing process is self assessing/editing our writing then re-writing/publishing the final piece. Remember, no writer ever has one go at their story or text they are always improving and improving until the final piece.

Parents/carers: This is a very informative video to show children the importance of this stage as this is the stage they are usually more reluctant with. https://youtu.be/E_6PskE3zfQ

First read through your story checking that everything makes sense.

Remember when editing, you should check you have included the success criteria: • adjectives • verbs • sentence of three • To challenge yourself add an embedded relative clause

Then check your punctuation: • Capital letter (At the start and for proper nouns) • Fullstops • Inverted commas for character speech • Commas in your embedded clauses

Check spellings using a dictionary/iPad and see if you can uplevel any of your words with a thesaurus.

📝 When you are done you are ready to re-write your story in your best handwriting.

If you have not written in appropriate paragraphs change that now.

Hers is a link for making a mini-book out of an a4 piece of paper. Have fun making your books and add illustrations if you have time!

Please feel free to email me any photos of your finished stories and let me know what enjoyed most and what you learned.

☺