hello and welcome to this free lesson by t.o. in which we are going to have a look at an a star narrative and think about what makes it so good now this lesson is planned for first language English IGCSE I am going to be really thinking about that Mark scheme however what makes an AAR narrative for first language igcs versus English language GCSE it's the same thing so whatever exam board you're doing this is still going to be a useful lesson for you all right let's get started do make sure that you download all of the resources that you'll need for today's lesson I have link it below you can get this PowerPoint and the worksheet as well as take a review quiz to check that you have understood everything that we've spoken about so go ahead and do that now and then let's get going let's begin first of all with some background information about narrative writing for first language English if this bit isn't relevant to you because you're doing English language GCSE feel free just to skip ahead and go straight to the the Exemplar now for first language IGCSE you will have to write a narrative either for your coursework or for your paper 2 depending on whether the school has decided that you'll do coursework route or exam route but either Which Way narrative writing is on your course so for coursework it will be your assignment three which is writing to narrate um and actually you have to write a narrative for your first language coursework but if you are doing paper two then narrative writing appears in section B composition where you have a choice of either a narrative or description so if you're doing paper two actually you don't necessarily have to write a narrative you could just go ahead and write the description if you wanted to um if you decide you know I'm I'm someone who's really really good at narrative writing so I'm going to do the narrative writing question that would be absolutely fine my personal advice though is you know make sure that you study descriptive writing and narrative writing and that way you'll have a good choice of both when you get into the exam and you can really pick a question that inspires you I have also got a video Lesson about descriptive writing which I will link up above question now have a little think why is a story like a mountain a story is like a mountain because it also has a peak right it's got the same shape this shape roughly so the plot structure should resemble a mountain with you beginning at the bottom gradually growing up things becoming more and more tense finally we reach the top the peak the climax and then obviously we have to come back down again just like most people climb a mountain don't just live there for the rest of their lives right so this all leads me nicely on to plot structure now whenever you're writing a story you need to follow this plot structure in order to get a good Mark so let's go through it all good stories need to begin with an introduction a good introduction will introduce the time the setting and the character so we need to know when is your story set where is your story set what is the setting like what are your characters like it should also introduce the main character's motivation what do they want what makes them get out of bed in the morning what do they care about and that might be something as simple as your main character is a knight and their main motivation in life is to win the jousting competition right so you need to have a think about what your characters want next you'll have have an inciting incident if you incite something it means you start something you could also think of this as the Catalyst if you like something that begins the action so your inciting incident is something that begins the main action of the plot and usually this is an obstacle something that prevents the main character from achieving what they desire so maybe our Knight who all that he wants in the world is to win the jousting competition suddenly the jousting pit is set on fire no competition can be held now the story has been incited because they need to find out who set that fire why did they set that fire how can I make the competition go back on track how can I prove myself to the queen to be the best Knight and the best jouster in all the land in Harry Potter the inciting incident would be all of the letters from Hogwarts arriving right and finally hagri turning up bang bang bang you're a wizard Harry that begins the rest of the plot now after the inciting incident you will have the risting tension this is actually usually the longest part of your story in the riseing tension you will build tension mystery suspense as The Story begins to reach its climax often riseing tension will have misunderstandings and conflict during the riseing tension it's basically questions right like who stole the diamond who set the fire will the knight ever win this jousting competition right these are all things that create tension things that your reader does not know and wants to know the answer to now in the climax we should get most of our questions answered all of these big questions will suddenly come to a head as we have to find out who set fire to the jousting pit so the climax and is the most intense or exciting part of the story and this might be physical it might be a fight or it might be emotional like an argument or a realization but by the climax I would say that all or 95% of your questions are answered because otherwise your reader is going to feel so unsatisfied right now for short stories for exams and for coursework sometimes you might not get a chance to do the resolution maybe you might have a cliffhanger here is someone falling down the cliff wait that's the opposite of a cliffhanger and a cliffhanger they're holding on to the cliff anyway you know what I mean so you might want to have some mystery left but if you don't answer the main question that it's kind of like what was the point of your story why have I read that so you can still leave some things a mystery like for example you might find out who set fire to the pit you might realize that it's the Knight's wife because she wants him to realize what really matters in life it's her and their family um so we realize who set fire to the jousting pit but we might not get on to the point of the the night actually having the competition because that that might become a bit boring that's not really the main point of the story so the conclusion should answer any of the final questions that the story has not yet addressed and in short stories keep it grief no more than one short paragraph nobody wants to read a resolution that is five paragraphs long that's like and then they lived happily ever after and then they had three children and their children were called Clara Amy and John and John was very good at playing the guitar just like his father and John also wanted to become a night too like that's so boring you've lost me so keep your resolution brief or have it as a the Cliffhanger but do make sure that your main question your main tension is resolved for reader satisfaction and happiness now how are narratives marks for Cambridge you will be awarded two different marks so you will get one mark for content and structure and one mark for style and accuracy let's begin with content and structure so when I talk about content it's basically you know what is your story about is that interesting and then structure how is your story structured how well are you following this diagram that I just showed you um and have you actually paragraphed correctly so notice then that in a top band it says the plot is well defined I can clearly go uhhuh yeah here's your introduction here's your insci and instant here's your right intention here's your Climax and here's your resolution I know each part of your story it's strongly developed with description characterization setting and an effective climax now you don't need to do anything that clever but it does need to be that you know if you've got questions here you have resolved them by the climax that basically is an effective climax so you do need to make sure that you are describing your setting describing your character um and you've got lots of little narrative details that you should also have a little bit of dialogue for example speech over here in band five you have got a plot which is now defined not well defined and developed but not strongly developed we've got climax but notice it no longer says effective maybe for this one okay we have got this plot structure but your climax might feel a little bit random you've not really left your Clues you not really left your questions or you've not fully answered everything so okay yes we've got a peak I can clearly see where the most exciting part of your story is doesn't really pay off not that effective down here in band for them your PL is relevant you have basically written the story maybe it might be a bit o but you've written a story and you will have some features of narrative writing for example you will have description character setting and all climax so maybe you will have a climax but you haven't really described your setting or your characters maybe you will have some great description and characterization but no climax right so here in band four you've got something missing now in band three you have got a straightforward plot which might be a bit like I went to the shops and I wondered who murdered my mom so I looked around and I saw John and John looked suspicious so it's like okay yeah it's a bit list-like it's a bit strange can't always follow what you're talking about um and it's not always necessarily completely a story and you've got limited use of narrative features so you're not going to have a climax maybe you've got some sort of character some sort of setting but you've not really completely written a story if you're going to be honest with yourself then for style and accuracy this is basic basically about your spark your spelling punctuation and grammar and your vocabulary your punctuation and your sentencing this is what we're thinking about so in band Six you are consistently accurate 99% of what you've written is accurate there are no spelling punctuation grammar mistakes you have got precise and effective vocabulary and a range of sentence structures and no to say almost always accurate grammar now if you've got one comma error big deal right you can still get in this band but when you start to have more errors maybe I can find five errors six errors in your writing then you're going to fall into here band five where you are mostly accurate you're mostly accurate right you've got some errors but they are minor they're infrequent your vocabulary is mostly precise and your sentencing is mostly varied so this here is like you are 95 to 100% great accurate interesting over here I might say that you are 80 to 95% great if we go down here we've got frequent small errors so maybe every other sentence has got something small about it that is incorrect your vocabulary is sometimes precise your sentencing is sometimes vared varied and you've got frequent small errors so over here I'm going to go with h should we go 50 to 80% um of your writing is accurate and then over here we're going into serious errors so where is here you've got lots of small errors but I always understand what you what you mean by the time we get into band three you've got very frequent grammar errors and sometimes I don't know what you mean sometimes I'm stopping and I'm reading your work and I'm scratching my head and I'm thinking what what's happening um so that will put you into band three so you've got simple childlike vocabulary and sentence structures and frequent grammar errors that are sometimes serious so here it's sometimes serious here it's they relatively minor but frequent oh no what am I doing no I just deleted it no it's okay I'll get it back up that's fine so frequent but minor but minor and then over here it's like okay they're infrequent but minor and then over here almost always accurate and maybe B ban three I'm just going to write huh what what are you talking about so that's how I would summarize the mark scheme for first language English narrative writing now before we move on to look at our examplar let me just quickly talk to you about one thing so common mistakes I see in coursework versus the exam so I teach coursework at my school but I Mark for the exam so I I know both of these actually quite well so for coursework the most common mistake that I see with my students is that their stories are often overly complicated and confusing like you are being too ambitious you are trying to write a novel in 800 words you have got flashbacks flash forwards your vocabulary you've used the thesaurus in every single word and I'm reading your story and I don't know what's happening if you ask me to summarize the events in your story I would really struggle that is the biggest error that I see for course work so what I recommend you do there is after you've written your coursework piece make a family member read it make a friend read it don't tell them anything about it simply say read this and then after they've read it say to them can you tell me what happens and if they cannot easily and concisely tell you what happened you have got a problem with your Clarity and you need to go back and you need to simplify your writing now on the flip side in the exam I kind of see the opposite problem now in the exam stories often too boring or too obvious I remember one year that I marked and the question was for narrative writing write a story that includes the phrase there was no signal at all and in this exam I knew that I had students that were from like different countries in Africa I saw Uganda and Kenya mentioned quite a lot and I know that I had students that were in the UK CU I saw British supermarkets like Tesco mention quite a lot so what I'm trying to say is I had students from like all over the world but you know what for this prompt whether you were British or Ugandan you all went on a road trip with your friends went into the woods or a forest or something like that got lost and realized that your mobile phone had no signal at all and I was like how has every single student no matter where they're from in the world written the same boring obvious unimaginative answer like how is that possible and that I see that year after year of students just writing these boring stories so what I suggest that you do if you're doing the exam whatever story prompt they've given you think of your first idea and then go good everyone else in the world has thought of that and throw it away and brainstorm and try to come up with an idea that is slightly more interesting because your examiner will thank you for it so coursework don't be overly complicated exam don't be too boring okay should we have a look at the exam plan now don't forget that you can download this Exemplar as a worksheet from my website if you prefer it's just linked down below now as we read I want you guys to think about this so you're going to think how is this examplar meeting the following marking criteria so for Content how does it create an engaging plot how does it have features of narrative writing such as characterization setting description and dialogue for structure how is it paragraphing correctly and also how is it paragraphing effectively How does each paragraph flow and Link nicely from one to the next and how is it creating a coherent plot that makes sense a plot that builds towards an effective climax for style we're thinking about where am I using sophisticated vocabulary precisely correctly where am I using varied punctuation where have I varied my sentence openings lengths and constructions and how have I made my register my language choices sound like a story sometimes I read stories and they sound like a recipe like an instruction manual oh first he did this and then he did this and it doesn't actually sound like a story sometimes students try to write sci-fi and it ends up sounding like a an like an extract from an encyclopedia Mars which is the planet closest to and you're like this doesn't sound like a story anymore so you need to sound like a story and finally accuracy where have I got accurate spelling punctuation and grammar okay ready let's read and just by the way okay for a little bit of context in case you don't know this story is all about someone who does a tough mud obstacle course race here are some pictures of tough mud so that you know what you should keep in your head it's basically like a race through mud with lots of different obstacles that you have to do like swinging from ropes um climbing up muddy Hills and through trenches and that kind of thing so just in case you're like what even is tough mother this is tough mother okay let's read race the top swiping bold Stripes of face pain on my cheeks I felt the adrenaline soaring through my body this would be the year that I'd come first get my name in the newspapers and finally beat Benson it was my seventh time competing and my seventh time coming second place tough M was advertised as a fun event with a party held afterwards for those fit enough to compete in the grueling obstacle course but I didn't feel much in the party mood as I weighed up Benson now stomping his way to the starting line Benson's gaze met mine an unspoken challenge that knocked away some of my certainty he clenched his fists set his jaw and smirked at me it was a red flag to a bull I'd spent the past year in intensive training weightlifting running and climbing I would fling bensam from his throne without mercy and claim my gold medal as I did although it was the crack of dawn the sun was already fiercely pounding down on the Feld below where the tough mud competition would be held sizzling my skin I hustled through the throngs of people now jostling around for a place at the starting line nodding hello to Marie an athletic woman with a towering physique who was warming up I elbowed and pushed and kicked until I found myself shoulder Tosh shoulder with bensam all right Sammy he said his voice like velvet his eyebrow cocked try not to feel too bad about another L it's a taking part that counts I fumbled for something witty to say in response but came up short shut up I muttered Benson's face split into a wide grin and his eyes glittered with Glee the announcer began the countdown the crowd roared I stealed myself on your marks get set go I leapt into the air maneuvering through the treacherous terrain and obstacles with the Precision of a Season Pro leaving Benson far behind years of practice had honed my skills transforming me into a graceful dancer amidst the chaos I leapt past Marie bounded through the obstacles and soared through the mud my steps light and Nimble I glided over the mud pits and then pirouetted over the gorge the next obstacle coming my way the king of the swingers the ropes and Nets were no match for my trained limbs my limbs flowed from one rope to the next swinging swaying across with ease a quick glance back filled me with satisfaction as I saw Benson stumbling as he navigated through mud mile a perilous Maze of trenches when he came up for air face in crusted with mud mouth dangling wide I flashed him a dazzling smile too easy I thought I sprinted to the final obstacle a massive muddy Hill that seemed to reach the heavens I hadn't expected a new obstacle this year and as I scrambled up the hill failing to find a foothold and sliding back down before realizing someone else was overtaking me I saw his wiry muscles and glittering eyes as he ascended the hill and I slid back down again like a wet fish finally finally I found purchas in a series of rocks obscured by the mud I gasped for breath as I reached the summit my pride wounded my victory in tatters from the crest of the hill I watched Benson's determined descent who was running down the hill at break neck speed time stopped a protruding Branch yanked at Benson's ankle gravity ripped Benson down to the ground the crowd silenced and now the only noise that could be heard was a sickening crack of Benson's bones upon the ground he didn't move again the air seemed thick and heavy as I Jed down the hill to Benson's lifeless form body crumpled eyes dazed leg bent out of shape how could I leave him like that and yet and yet the Finishing Line glittered and gleamed in my periphery promising that elusive gold medal if I just walked another 100 met to cross it hey I said crouching you okay Benson stirred scrunching up his eyes go on then he said it's your year go get your medal and you can glow later the more I considered leaving Benson the more I knew what I had to do but that didn't mean I had to be happy about it grabbing came from under his armpit I yanked Benson to his feet supporting his weight as I began to carry him half limping towards the checkered Finish Line our sweaty muddy bodies hobbled ungainly forwards turning us into a four-legged monster fine I thought we'll win this together abruptly rapidly Marie stre past us splattering us with mud as she plowed through the field with alarming velocity and darted past the Finishing Line to Rous Applause Benson suddenly seemed to weigh an extra 50 kilos oh well I said as I continued looking us forward I believe you said it's the taking part that counts and just a quick heads up if you've noticed the red underlines no these are not spelling mistakes I am British but my laptop has got American settings so this these are the British ways of spelling the words um Cambridge actually doesn't care if you spell things in a British way or or an American way as long as you are consistent just a a little heads up there and a quick defense no I've not misspelled words now if you've got the worksheet then you can see that there are a series of questions here to help you have a think about what makes this such an effective narrative do pause the screen now and head over there have a little think where is this meeting the marking criteria and where is it gaining marks for Content structure style and accuracy okay so now let's unpick the Exemplar what makes this such a good narrative why would it get an A Star for both coursework and also for the exam certainly for the exam firstly can you identify the structure of race to the top what is our introduction inciting instant writing tension Climax and resolution there is a space for you to do this on your worksheet or if you're in a rush you can just pause the screen and have a quick little think here are the answers then so our introduction in the introduction we've got Samy our protagonist our main character who is preparing for the tough m competition he's determined to win and we learn that this is his seventh year of coming second place so the stakes are quite high he really really wants to actually get first place this time what is the inciting incident this is when we have got Sammy and Benson who is already his rival but they have that exchange of words right they have a little argument at The Starting Line This intensifies the competition between them our rise intention is basically everything from the race beginning um and onwards so this is when the race begins and Samy competes and he begins to overtake Benson leaving him behind but as they get up the muddy Hill Sammy is struggling he slips down and this is when Benson overtakes him and it seems like Benson will now win the climax however is when Benson Falls and injures himself and then Sammy decides to Forfeit winning to help Benson cross the Finishing Line the wholeway through the question is you know will Sammy win and can they overcome this rivalry rivalry so at the climax we've got these questions answered right will Sammy win maybe but not alone and will they end their rivalry we're getting closer towards it right the resolution though is that Marie actually beats both of the men to the finishing line but even though Sammy now knows that neither of them can win he continues to help Benson to cross and he has a little joke he says it's a taking part that counts he quotes Sammy from the start if you've done my descriptive writing lesson then you'll know that this creates circular structure as the start and the end link together and Cambridge love that they love it right um and it also shows some development his attitude has matured his earlier attitude is Boo I don't want to come second now it's okay fine I'm coming second I'm actually coming joint second with my enemy so we can see some real character development and growth in this bit here now we're going to go through bit by bit and pick out different bits of the story that are really good so setting setting is all about where and when your story is set what is the atmosphere like what is the weather like and don't forget that you should describe your setting briefly throughout you shouldn't forget where your characters are it shouldn't be like at the start you're like oh it was really muddy and the sky was dark and then by the end we've never ever mentioned the set again like surely the darkness might become a problem in the plot maybe they might get mud in their shoes and their hair on their face so don't ignore where you are after the first paragraph but this is all part of creating a realistic picture in your reader's mind now if we have a look at a small section of my setting have a think what makes this section of the setting so effective so we're learning when it is right it's very early in the morning it's at the crack of dawn and we're learning something about the weather it is fiercely hot the sun is already pounding down that might create some intensity it might also symbolize the fire the animal osity between the two men so it creates that little bit of tension there as well and in fact it's so hot that it's actually burning our main character skin we're also learning that they are at tough M of competition and we get some description of the atmosphere at that setting so it's incredibly busy it's chaotic um and it's just filled with people so there are throngs of people jostling around everyone trying to fight to get to the the starting line we see Marie for the first time here too who will become significant later on and it's so busy that our protagonist Sammy has to Elbow push and kick to get to the finish the starting line with Benson so we've got some quite nice detailed description of setting we know a lot about it we know where it is when it is what the weather's like what the atmosphere is like and it makes sense too like it relates to the story this fiery weather just like the fiery relationship between Sammy and Benson up next we have got characterization so good characterization is when you create realistic characters that feel like real people so you really need to think about these three questions what do they look like what is their appearance what are their personalities like are they kind are they loud are they annoying are they very very intelligent and what motivates them what do they care about right Samy really cares about coming first he's a highly competitive person he's also not particularly intelligent because when Benson is trying to have a bit of an argument with him he can't think of anything clever to say back now remember that real people are not perfect give them a flaw give them a fault I read so many stories where it's like the main character is generic teenager and generic teenager is pretty and smart and nothing else right so give them something that makes them not perfect like Sammy is so competitive that it actually makes him kind of a bad person he for a second thinks about leaving Benson there and even after he does decided to still carry B across the Finishing Line he's not being particularly nice about it um and like I said earlier too he's not particularly intelligent either so Samy is definitely a flawed character now if we think about Samy in this section here you will see that he is merciless a little bit cruel and Hyper competitive right so let's read um so it was supposed to be a fun event it was advertised as a fun event but Sammy doesn't feel in a part mood right so even though everyone else around him is probably is having fun he's maybe taking it a bit too serious like it even says there's going to be a party after oh here here this is where it says it says there's going to be a party held afterwards so everyone else is having a nice time except for Sammy it seems like he's waiting up Benson so before Benson's even said or done anything to him he's looking him up and down trying to figure out okay you in a better shape this year can I beat you this year um and as soon as they look at each other there's an unspoken can challenge so both men are actually quite similar in that way I think they are both hyper competitive and quite rude to each other um because it says that Benson clenches his fists sets his jaw and smirks at him so clench fists manly set jaw and H an evil mean smile but then Sammy is quite clearly easily angered because as soon as Benson does this he says it's like a red flag to a ball he's immediately ready to be aggressive to be rude um and we also learned that Sammy is very very athletic he's obviously um he obviously cares a lot about this competition athletic he obviously cares a lot about this competition he spent the whole year training so he's obviously a disciplined person but why has he spent this whole year training what's he been thinking about beating Benson that's it that's what motivates him um because he says that he will fling Benson from his throat gr own without Mercy this perhaps shows that he's putting too much thought and weight into what is essentially a a a fun muddy obstacle course he sees it as a throne like Benson is a king and getting a gold medal almost makes it sound like the Olympics so he's definitely taking this whole competition too seriously so notice just in this first paragraph how much we can pick out about sami's personality and what motivates him not so much about his appearance maybe that's something that could improve but I think that you might be able to tell from the fact that he's been weightlifting running and climbing he's very very athletic and in the first paragraph I do talk about how he's got Stripes of face paint on his face but I don't really say like how old he is or what color his hair is I don't know if that's always relevant like it's sometimes a bit boring to be like here is Sammy he has blonde hair and blue eyes and he is six foot you know maybe maybe not so relevant leave something to your readers imagination now you can also include some dialogue in your stories but do keep your dialogue brief and purposeful so not too much dialogue and it should serve a function in your plot it should be there for a reason my general recommendation is no more than six lines of dialogue in a story because what I've noticed students do is they kind of turn their story in the end into a boring he said she said script what what where is the mobile phone he said I don't know I thought you had it she said oh I found it but there is no signal at all he said oh no what are we going to do she said and it becomes so boring and so underdeveloped and there's no description and I I just I just don't like it so I would say don't include too much dialogue because you might run the risk of becoming that boring script like story do remember that you are trying to replicate real spoken language so you wouldn't have Sammy for example being like oh hello Benson how are you it is nice to see you again but today I am going to beat you at the compet ition like how do real people real men speak to each other they speak to each other like you're all right Sammy reckon you're going to win like more brief more casual so you're trying to make it sound actually spoken you can do that by using contractions so instead of saying I am say I am instead of saying was not say wasn't instead of saying did not say didn't you could also use some ellipses to show that someone is pausing and remember that if you do decide to have dialogue that a new speaker means a new paragraph must be started every time someone new speaks you must go onto a new line right it must form a new paragraph especially for coursework I often see this mistake of it's a big long paragraph but it's actually got multiple people speaking so it should be separated and then once students do separate it I'm like look can you see how underdeveloped your writing is can you see how it's become a script can you see how it's become he said she said but they didn't even notice CU they just put it all together in one big dialogue paragraph anyway anyways now if we have a look at a section from my story the dialogue let's have a think why is this dialogue effective all right Sammy he said his voice like velvet his eyebrow cocked try not to feel too bad about another L it's the taking part that counts I fumbled for something witty to say in response but came up short shut up I muttered Benson's face split into a wide grin and his eyes glitter with great Glee so here noticed new speaker new Lon so this bit here is Benson speaking then Sammy speaking and then information about Benson so each of these requires a new paragraph all right also notice how this actually sounds like spoken language people do actually say all right or even you're all right um and then here we've also got contractions its and I've also got a right it's a taking it's too bad about another lost a right so that's also something that people would say rather than write also with my dialogue tags you can see here I'm not just saying he said he said over and over again here I've got he muttered what else makes this really good dialogue though is that it serves a purpose it tells us something about their personalities and it serves a reason for the plot so here it's kind of Sammy W uh it's Benson winding up Sammy he's trying to get in mad he's showing that this context of you've got another loss and we've also got the line that we know that that we know is going to be repeated at the end of the story so it definitely serves a purpose here and here I'm trying to show that Samy although he's got lots of big talk about how he's going to throw Ben and his throne without Mercy when he's actually like confronting with the man to have an argument with him he can't really argue back very much he seems a little bit stressed he can't think of anything witty to say so yeah I'm going to throw Benson from his throne but the second they have an argument it's just shut up so it's serving a purpose to show us something about that characterization too and equally Benson's response he's got a wide grain and his eyes are glittering like they are very much Rivals so this is really the purpose of this dialogue here too you also need to have frequent description throughout your story so just because you're not writing a description doesn't mean that you don't have to have description if you see what I mean so you are still being marked for style and the use of description the use of interesting language so remember to still be using language devices like simil and metaphor and personification and to show don't tell don't tell me that Sammy is a petty person show me through his actions right now let's look at some description in my story so what makes this description effective I leapt into the air maneuvering through the treacherous terrain and obstacles with the Precision of a Season Pro leaving Benson far behind so the whole purpose of this paragraph is to show us how graceful and effective Sammy is during the race almost like it's a dance and also in this bit because he's beating Benson he feels really good so there's lots and lots of positive vocabulary and descriptions to make us feel just like Sammy yes I am dancing through the mud mahaha Benson far behind me contrast it with later on once benza starts winning and he says oh I I slid down the hill like a wet fish so as soon as he's no longer winning the descriptions become a lot more negative and pessimistic compared to here it says that he is transformed into a graceful dancer amidst the chaos so here we've got a lovely metaphor he leapt past Marie bounded through the obstacles and soared through the mud here we've got triples or list of three he leapt he bounded and he soared and again all of these very very positive verbs being used his steps are light and Nimble he glided over the mud pits and then pirouetted over the gorge once again we're using vocabulary that is associated with dancing um to show how graceful and effective he is what a beautiful job he's doing of making his way through these obstacles then he goes to the king of the swingers but the ropes and Nets were no match for my trained limbs my limbs flowed from one to the other swinging and swaying across here we've got some alliteration with swinging and swaying um and we've also got his limbs flowed which makes me think of water like it's so seamless it's so effortless because he's just so talented did you know guys Sammy the king of the swingers so we've got this lovely description here which really brings it to life whilst also being rise in tension whilst also telling us something about sami's personality now to get in the top band of content and structure you need to have an effective Climax and you really can't have an effective climax without effective rise in tension right because otherwise why would your climax be effective if no one even cares it's like all right this story is really boring but here's a climax I don't I don't suddenly care you you have to keep me interested the wholeway through for it to be effective so your riseing tension is vital to give your climax payoff so good riseing tension will create questions or Mysteries that your climax should resolve so here are some of the questions in the riseing tension of my story will Sammy win the race will Benson beat him once again will Sammy help Benson once he falls how will either man react if they lose the race like if Sammy loses how will he react if Benson loses for the first time how will he react and can their rivalry ever be resolved so these are all questions that we want to know as we're going through the story that the climax does answer mostly right so it makes the climax that much more effective in this paragraph it's the last bit of rise in tension before we really get to our Climax and this is just after the paragraph that we've looked at so prior to this Sammy was winning winning Sammy was good Sammy was happy sammy was pouting leaping and gliding not anymore so as he Sprints to the final obstacle a massive muddy Hill some literation there um which seemed to reach the heavens um is that a a simile because it's not saying it is reaching the heavens it's saying it seemed to I'm going to go with simile um and he scrambles up the hill now because we've got this new obstacle that he can't do very well look at how much more negative it becomes and so the tension starts to rise because we thought before okay for sure now sami's actually going to win but now the tension is going higher because he's not doing so well anymore so again it seems like who is actually going to win now he is scrambling up the hill he fails to find a footh hole and he slides back down before realizing someone else was overtaking me the stakes keep getting higher will Sammy win sami's not doing so well someone's going to overtake him who is it oh no right tension tension attention now we see wiry musles muscles and glittering eyes it doesn't even say who it is but because we've had Benson described before with glittering eyes we know it's Benson but again this increases the tension and here as Benson ascends poor Samy slides down so we've got this tension of one going up one going down and a very negative sad language he's like a wet fish I made myself laugh when I wrote that can you tell but this is a story that I wrote by the way be kind um and then finally finally finally finally riseing tension Sammy does manage to climb the hill but he knows it's probably too late because he's already seen Benson go over the top of the hill right so that on the hill we can't see everything that's going on that's also increasing tension we seen Benson go over the top Sam Samy's down here what's going to happen as he finally gets to the top and he reaches the summit the top of the hill his pride is wounded his victory is in tatters this whole thing that motivates Sammy what motivates him is I want to win this year what is he going to do now that he's probably going to lose so all of this is building up the tension but of course we know what comes next right in our climax so the climax should be the most exciting and intense part of your story bit weird if your introduction is the most exciting part like why would anyone carry on caring if it just gets more and more boring so your climax should answer all or most of the questions that your story has raised so story will Samy win this race no but will Benson be able to beat him once again also no will Samy help help Benson yes he will but he is begging he doesn't necessarily want to do it he just feels morally obliged to how will e men react if they lose this race well they're both unhappy when they lose but actually they've got quite good humor compared to the start when they're arguing that they have a little bit of a joke and can their rivalry ever be resolved this one isn't fully answered it appears appears maybe so because now Sam's helped Benson so there's a chance for them to become friends but I don't I don't like do another paragraph when it's like and after this day Sammy and Benson became the best of friends and Sammy was actually at Benson's wedding and became Godfather to his son and they used to go f and they went fishing every single day like that would just be so boring right we were leaving up to the readers's imagination whether or not Sammy and Benson actually managed to resolve their rivalry after the story is finished now this part here is my climax this is when Sammy has seen Benson fall over and knows okay I need to decide what to do his decision is the climax really the more I considered leaving Benson the more I knew what I had to do but I didn't mean I had to be happy about it he grabs him from under his armpit a little bit of violent imagery there he's not being kind and gentle like oh come on how are you just your foot Hur and he Yanks Benson to his feet but he does support him as they walk half limping towards the cross line and they turn into a four-legged monster and he thinks well fine we'll win this together so here we've got some sort of resolution to this question of can Sammy finally be a good sport can he finally start being so horrible and so hyper competitive and actually be a good person and the answer is yeah kind of yeah he can now in relation to structure and climax your climax should not feel completely random it should be a natural pression of events that could realistically happen so what you want to do is you want to drop hints and clues throughout your story that will build up towards your climax but you don't want it to be so obvious that when your readers reading the story and they notice the clues they're like oh that's obviously what the ending is going to be so they don't need to read anymore you have to be subtle you can't be too like smacking your reader on the face with the clues so for example at the end of my story it's actually Marie that beats the two men now I wasn't sure if I did a very good job of this I did try try to put some clues in like for example I mentioned Marie twice before she wins the race my story is only like 800 words so how many times can you realistically mention Marie without making it too obvious what's going to happen so we meet Marie at the start when we hear that she is towering and athletic and warming up and we also hear about her again in the middle when it says that Sammy bounded P Marie so that shows that Marie is also at the front of the race and then we hear about her for the third and final time when she beats both of the men um to the Finish Line it's also becomes quite ironic because Samy overlooked her like his real competition wasn't Benson his real competition was Marie but because he was so clouded by his rivalry and so fixed and focused on Benson he didn't even really notice the person that was really threatening the crown the gold medal so do you think that the effect the exemp was effective at dropping hints I don't know I think he was good I'd still get an e star um but I think it could have been a bit more effective in terms of Marie maybe if you got some suggestions or like some example sentences you could suggest them in the comments I could try to add them into my story um I think I did pretty good but I think that it could be better that's that's some advice that I would give myself about my story but yes your climax shouldn't feel random you should have some hints and clues and it should feel natural something else that you can do that Cambridge really like is a circular structure this is also what I taught you in the descriptive writing structure lesson so you start and end with a similar point right so for example you might have a story set in a coffee shop and The Story begins with the open sign being turned and ends with the sign being turned to closed right that would be a circular structure so it's when you begin and end with a similar idea or theme to bring your story to a satisfying close so for example at the start Benson says to Sammy uh try not to feel too bad about another l it's the taking part that counts and then this part is repeated at the very end oh well I said as I continued looking us forward I believe you said it's the taking part that counts this becomes all the more effective because actually at the start neither of them believe that but by the end they're starting to believe that they're starting to see okay we're helping each other maybe this race isn't all about who wins but a little bit about sportsmanship and being a good person so yes it's come circular but it's not like it's not like this phrase has just been repeated something has changed this phrase is relevant it's got a meaning that's why it's been put there and now my final tips for narrative writing do make sure especially if you're doing coursework that your story is clear can a friend summarize literal events if you're doing exam don't be boring character do you make sure that you have at least two characters who are named and described I should be able to tell you something about their personalities setting what place is your story set and when is it set don't forget to refer back to your setting have description of that throughout climax what is your story building to what will the peak of your story Mountain be and in order to get there and make it an effec in Climax make sure that you have added tension so there should be some sort of unanswered question in your story that will keep your reader engaged and that question needs to be answered in your Climax and do remember you get so many marks for accuracy so do save time to check your spelling punctuation and grammar if you are doing coursework then use your spell checker use grammarly literally why wouldn't you it's not cheating to do that and proof read your writing to just because you've grammarly checked something doesn't mean that it's now accurate grammarly doesn't pick up all of the mistakes so I always recommend read your story out loud because then you can hear when a lot of the mistakes come up or where something doesn't flow or sound natural if you're doing the exam make sure that you save time at the the end to proof read go back over your work especially check for um commas and full stops make sure that you've used those correctly and do check that you've not been repetitive and repeated the same word over and over again because you're trying to show off how precise and sophisticated your vocabulary is if you like this video Lesson and you want to see more like it then you can go on to my website to.co where you'll see lots and lots of different video lessons and quizzes and also teaching resources if you're joining us on YouTube please do subscribe to my YouTube channel give this a like ask any questions that you might have in the comments and I'll try to reply and hopefully I'll see you in my next video bye