WRITING _
Story 1
In Part 2 of Paper 2 you may be asked to write a story. Often, you are given the first sentence and asked to continue the story. You may want to use direct and reported speech, but be careful not to use dialogue throughout.
A Sample task
You have been asked to write a short story for a class competition. Begin your story with these words: It was nearly midnight when the doorbell lang. Write your story in 120-180 words.
B Read the following story and answer these questions.
1 What do you notice about the punctuation and layout of direct speech? Pind three things to say.
2 What do you notice about the tenses in reported speech?
3 How many words can you find in the story that refer to ways of talking (for example, say)1.
C Change the underlined parts of the story into direct speech.
Example: The driver said 'Exactly ten years ago,...
D Writing task
You have been asked to write a short story for a school competition. Your story must begin with these words:
I was woken in the night by a noise downstairs. Write your story in 120-180 words.
E Plan what yon are going to say in the story. Think about the following questions:
Was anyone else in the house at the time? What time was it? What sort of noise was it? What or who did you think it might be? Did you think about going downstairs yourself? Did you phone for help? Where was the phone?
Who decided to go downstairs to have a look? Who/What did they find? What were they doing? How had they got in? What (if anything) did they say? What happened in the end?
F When you have decided what the story will be about, add a few details to the following plan.
1 Setting the scene
's
It was nearly midnight when the doorbell rang. I opened the door and saw a girl with a motorbike helmet. She was covered in blood.
'Oh, no,' I said. 'What has happened?'
'Please help me,' the girl said weakly. 'There's been an accident. My boyfriend is outside.'
I helped her to a chair. She was bleeding a lot.
'I'll call an ambulance,' I said.
I ran to the sitting room and phoned for an ambulance. Then I ran back to the girl. But she had disappeared. I went outside, but there was no sign of her or the motorbike in the silent street.
When the ambulance arrived, I explained what had happened. The driver went pale. He said that exactly ten years ago, his daughter and her boyfriend had had a motorbike crash. He went on to say that the bov had been killed instantly. His daughter had gone to ask for help in the house I was now living in, but she had died a few minutes later.
The ambulance left. As I stood in the hall, I noticed there was no longer any blood on the chair where the girl had been sitting.
Woke up, heard a noise... crept to Mum and Dad room.
2 Deciding what to do
3 What happened next
4 What they said
5 Ending
G Try and use some direct and reported speech in your story. For example, you could relate your first conversation with the other people in the house (your mother or father) in direct speech, and the conversation with the intruder or polic in reported speech.
1 Start a new paragraph every time the speaker changes.
2 Use opening and closing inverted commas for direct speech.
3 If the speech is broken by he said/he replied etc., then a comma is put before the closing inverted commas, for example 'Come in,' he said.
H Remember the following points about the punctuation and layout of direct speech.
WRITING _
Story 2
You may be asked to write a story ending with a particular sentence. You can use the simple past, past perfect and past continuous to help you make the order of events clear.
A Sample task and answer
Write a short story of about 180 words ending with the following sentence:
Jake knew he was saved.
It was already nearly six o'clock, and darkness was falling. Although Jake was quite high up the mountain, he couldn't see very far. The mist was getting thicker all the time, and the rain was coming down harder.
He couldn't understand where he had gone wrong. When he had set out that morning, the weather had been fine. Halfway through the morning, he had decided to take a short cut across the mountain. Now, as he sat down to look at the map, he realized that he must have taken the wrong path. He had no idea where he was. He stood up, feeling the cold rain trickling down his back, and set off down the side of the mountain.
Two hours later, it was completely dark. As he stumbled and fell, Jake knew he was really lost and began to wonder whether he would ever get back alive. Exhausted, he finally collapsed beside a large rock.
Some time later, he heard what sounded like a car engine. He hurried towards it and soon found himself on a rough track. He turned his head, and in the distance saw the car's headlights coming towards him. Jake knew he was saved.
B Put the events of the story in the correct order. The first one has been done for you.
• It got completely dark.
• He set out on the journey. /
• The weather changed.
• He saw the car.
• He found himself on a track.
• He noticed the weather was good. ■ He decided to take a short cut.
• He collapsed by a rock.
• He heard a car.
• He realized he had gone the wrong way.
C Look at the story again. Find two examples where the same tense is used to:
1 set the scene at the beginning of the story and describe what was happening at the time.
2 describe what happened before the beginning of the story.
3 describe events that take place one after the other in the story and are all seen as complete actions.
D Complete this story with the correct form of the verb in brackets.
It was half past eight, Jennifer fl sit] alone in the restaurant waiting for Patrick to arrive. She (2 pretend] to read the menu and (3 try) very hard not to appear worried that he wouldn't come.
Suddenly he (4 be) there beside her. He told her how lovely she looked, and she (5 be) glad that she (6 take) particular care that evening. She (7 choose) his favourite dress and (8 put) on the necklace that he (9 give) her for her birthday.
Dinner was wonderful. They enjoyed the food and (10 talk] happily throughout the meal. As they (11 be) about to leave, Patrick (12 take) a small package from his pocket and (13 give) it to Jennifer. It (14 be) a ring!
E Writing task
Write a short story ending with this sentence: With a sigh of relief, he realized that he was going to be all right.
F You may use the following notes.
• Write about a friend in a car rally across the Sahara desert. Half way across, bis car broke down.
• Paragraph 1: Imagine your friend and his car in the desert. Describe the scene - say what the weather was like, what he could see and hear, how he felt, and what he was doing at this moment. Use the past continuous form [was doing] for some of the verbs. For stative verbs like see, hear, use he could see... etc.
• Paragraph 2: Talk about how he got into this situation and about some of the events that took place from the beginning of the race until the car broke down. Use mainly the past perfect (GS 13.2.4) - for example: The race had started very well, and he had made good progress at the start.
• Paragraph 3: Talk about what happened next. Give details of what he did and how he managed to be rescued. Use mainly the past simple (GS 13.2.1)-
f or example: In the distance, he saw a large sand dune and began to walk towards it.
• Make sure you end the story with the sentence you are given.