Creative Writing
Working with setting
Revealing images
Classroom Activity
Use the Sensory language prompts resource to explore these images in pairs/groups. Use think-pair-share as a strategy to get a wide range of responses to the settings. Ask pupils to link places with types of people. Who would be at home in this place? Ask the pupils to consider someone who would not belong in this place – how would they react?
Use the Visual Stimulus resource and Image Revealer resource to encourage discussion and sharing ideas.
Use hot-seating and Conscience Alley to expand on these ideas as preparation for short descriptive paragraphs. For more details on these and other active learning strategies, have a look at the CCEA Active Learning and Teaching Methods booklet.
Use AfL techniques (e.g. Critical Friend questions) to allow the students to evaluate each other’s work in pairs, allowing time to feedback and share good examples with the whole group.
Describe a room
Classroom Activity
Ask pupils to bring in a still image of a room or a setting from a TV show or film they have watched. In pairs, ask them to describe the character who is most closely associated with the setting.
Together, examine the image and see if there are any details that give clues to the type of person whose room it is.
Hilda Ogden’s Living Room
Classroom Activity
Ask pupils to look at a set from a programme or film they are very familiar with e.g. Coronation Street or Eastenders. What do the details in the room tell us about the character who lives there? Next, pupils could create a description of the room to reflect the inhabitants. You may find the Describe a room resource useful. Other sources of sets might include sitcoms like Father Ted and Mrs Brown's Boys.