You need to turn the basic ideas you’ve stored in your brainstorms into full story plans. There are some pupils can happily start writing without a plan, but they tend to grind to a halt after about ten minutes, or end up waffling. The non-planner discovers after a side of writing that they can’t end the story because it isn’t actually going anywhere! 

We’ll be exploring the five most popular ways to plan an extremely short story - and there certainly isn’t a ‘right’ or a ‘wrong’ way to plan.  With practice, you’ll discover which method(s) works for you. 

These are the five most popular methods for turning a brainstorm into a full plan:

  1. Goal-impediment-solution
  2. Beginning-middle-end
  3. A Series of events
  4. Five paragraphs
  5. Story map

But whichever method you use you must always remember our fab four:

This is my favourite method for planning an extremely short story. You’ll be familiar with it from our work in Years Four and Five, but what you may not yet recognise are the advantages of planning a story in this manner. Goal-impediment-solution isn’t the easiest way to plan, but the main advantage it has over the other methods is that it ensures your plan contains conflict.  If your character faces a single, difficult impediment then you always have conflict at the heart of your story!

The basic concept of goal-impediment-solution is simple:

  • A person (or a cute little dog) has a wish, desire, need, objective or goal, e.g. Bob wants to score the winning goal in the F.A. Cup final.

  • There is a problem or impediment that has to be overcome first, e.g. Bob has to squeeze the ball past a goalie who seems to fill the entire goalmouth.
  • The character finds a solution to their problem: the impediment is overcome, the objective is gained or the wish granted, e.g. Bob swings back his leg…trips over… and the goalie laughs so hard that he doesn’t notice the ball trickle through his legs!  Goal!

You’ll surely be familiar with this situation from your Maths lessons!

This isn’t that tricky, is it?  A goal is simply something you want. It could be bars of gold locked in a New York bank, the hand in marriage of a beautiful prince or the ability to fly like all the other ducklings.

We all come across a thousand impediments every day: I don’t want to go to school tomorrow – but I’ll get sacked if I don’t turn up; you want curry for lunch – oh no, Mum has made chips!  The skill (and the tricky part of the planning process) is to find a convincing way out of your problem.

Goal-impediment-solution planning:

  • You’ll always have conflict at the heart of your story.
  • The focus on a single goal ensures you keep your story simple.
  • An ideal method for extremely short stories.

  • Some stories don’t have an obvious goal or impediment.
  • The plan doesn’t tell you where each part of the story will appear on the page.
  • Takes a bit of time to get your head around the idea of a ‘solution’.

The ‘goal-impediment-solution’ method of planning is the best if you want to be sure to include conflict in your stories.

When you were in the Lower School you probably learnt to plan with a ‘beginning, middle and an end’.  Fair enough. If you ask Mum, Dad or Auntie Sue to help you plan a story you’ll probably be told to think of a beginning, middle and end. But be careful: I think it is difficult to plan a story with a beginning, middle and end whilst remembering our ‘fab four’ rules of simplicity and conflict.

Let’s look at an example:

This may seem like a silly example, but it makes my point. The plot above has a beginning, middle and an end, but it isn’t a story! Why? Even though there is a beginning, a middle and an end, it doesn’t have a problem. You must think about conflict when planning for using a beginning-middle-end format:

Beginning-Middle-End planning:

  • Makes it easy for adults to help you.
  • Every story has to have a beginning, a middle and an end anyway.
  • This method makes it obvious how to structure your story on the paper.

 

  • It is easy to write over-complicated plots.
  • You must remember to include conflict.

 

 

Beginning-middle-end is the simplest planning method.

Another way to plan is to think of a series of events. Some of your parents might encourage you to plan like this:

Keep the number of things happening in your stories to a minimum, giving you the time and space to include lots of description and feelings.

A Series of Events Planning:


  • A simple way to develop your brainstorm
  • You can make sure that something actually happens in your story

 

 

 


  • It is all too easy to end up with stories which are far too complicated to do justice in 1½ sides of A4.
  • Easy to make things overcomplicated.
  • Easy to end up with stories in a Year One style – a list of things happening, rather than a plot: ‘Then this happened…then this happened…then this happened…’

 

 

We are training you to plan your Non-fiction essays in terms of five paragraphs, including an introduction and a conclusion. You could do the same thing when you plan a story:

‘Five paragraphs’ is a simple way to plan, but it gets difficult when you include talking in your stories – because, technically speaking, each piece of speech is a new paragraph!

This planning method is also particularly useful if you are writing a non-linear story (click here for details on how to write a non-linear story).


  • You know where on the page each part of the story will appear.

 

 

 

 

  • You need to remember to include conflict
  • You may just write a list of events rather than a story: ‘This happened…then this happened…then this happened…’
  • This method is very confusing once you begin to include speech

 

 

This is a good method if you struggle to connect your plan to how you set the story out on the page – and if you are writing a non-linear story.

Struggle to put your ideas into words? Try creating a story map: draw your plan, like a cartoon. A story map can contain all the information contained in a written plan, i.e. characters, a location, and a beginning, middle and end.

Story maps work particularly well for stories concerning journeys or quests. Many stories are built around the concept of a quest, from Rosie’s Walk to Lord of the Rings. The basic idea is to send the character on a journey from a to b.

As they travel, the character will have to overcome various hurdles. A frame for this story might look like this:

Story Maps Planning:

  • Can help you to imagine the characters and the setting.
  • A quick way to plan
  • Helpful if you are a slow at writing.

 

 

 


  • Pupils often just waste time drawing a pretty picture.
  • You need to remember to include conflict.
  • You may end up with a list of events rather than a story: ‘This happened…then this happened…then this happened…’
  • You have to make sure that you make your map clear, or you might not understand it when you’re halfway through writing the story!

 

 

Story maps are a good method if you struggle to put your ideas into words.


(c) Nick Hitchen 2007
Last updated on August 12, 2007