Planning: Planning from a Picture

Inventing Characters Read! Journal Word Notebook

Choosing Titles The Fab Four Golden Rules Generating Ideas Stealing Ideas From an Idea to a Plan Planning from a Picture Stories Based on a Passage Stories Based on a Sentence An Example of Good Planning

Describing a Location Longer descriptions Describing a character's appearance Dialogue Distinctive Voices Show, Don't Tell Characterisation: Shown Feelings More Characterisation Techniques Playing with Sentences Playscripts Action Suspense

What is story structure? 1 Exciting opening line 2 Set the scene 3 Talking and describing character 4 Characterisation 5 Suspense 6 Action 7 Cliffhanger Standing Out: How can you stand out from the crowd? Clever Clogs: Non-Linear Clever-clogs: Two perspectives Clever-clogs: Narrative voice Practice 11+ exam titles

Checking your story in an exam Redrafting = improving your story What if I run out of time in an exam? The Grumpy Examiner's Pet Hates

Year 2 into 3 Lemony Snicket After Harry Potter Must-Read Authors Spy Novels Horror Stories Classics Animal Stories Adventure Historical Fiction Myths & Legends Fantasy Family Stories & Comedies

Some exams may present you with a picture, and ask you to write a story based on it.

When planning any story, let alone from a picture prompt, it is important to remember the following points:

Your story must be relevant – you’ve got to base the plot around the picture!
Keep it simple: you’ve only got ½ hour to write. This means planning around two/three characters in a single location.
There must be a problem or a difficulty facing the protagonist. We call this conflict.
The best candidates will try to make their story distinctive. How can you impress the Grumpy Examiner?

Picture prompts will almost always give you a location and one or more characters. To be RELEVANT you need to base your plan around these characters and locations. It really is that easy!

Study the picture carefully. What information have you been given? Characters? A location? Conflict? Now begin to plan the whole story in your preferred style, i.e. plan the goal-impediment-solution.

Last updated on August 12, 2007