Lesson video

Hello, everybody, I'm Miss Corbett and welcome to today's lesson, which is all about writing a character description of Ada Twist.

To help you, we are going to pull evidence from the book to write our descriptions.

So, can you make sure that you have your copy of "Ada Twist, Scientist" by Andrea Beaty.

You will also need to make sure that you have some paper with lines on so you can do your neatest handwriting for your description.

Can you pause the video to go and get those things now? Off you go.

Fantastic! Thank you for getting those things so quickly.

I think we're ready to get started.

Can you show me that you're listening? Can you turn on those listening ears, that thinking brain, and those looking eyes? Well done.

Let's get started.

And the outcome for today's lesson is: I can write descriptive sentences about the main character of a story.

And these keywords will help us to get there.

So your first job today is to repeat them after me in your loudest and proudest voice, and then throughout our lesson, search for them as we go.

Are you ready? My turn, your turn.

Character.

Description.

Adjective.

Adverb.

Joining word.

Thank you so much for joining in with me.

The first part of our lesson will be: Describing a character's appearance.

We know that rereading a story helps us to remember the plot as well as notice details in the text and the illustrations.

So I would like you to get your copy of "Ada Twist, Scientist" ready, which is so exciting.

And whilst you're listening to the story, think about all of the things that we learn and know about Ada.

Have you got your copy ready? I would like you to read or listen to the whole story without stopping, just to enjoy it.

Pause the video now.

I really hope you enjoyed some uninterrupted listening and reading from the beginning to the end.

How could we describe Ada? Could you pause the video and tell your person nearby everything you know about Ada? Off you go.

Amazing.

Those descriptions will really help us today, because in this lesson we are going to write a character description of Ada Twist.

Ada is the main character in the story.

The author, Andrea Beaty, follows her story of becoming a scientist, focusing on her personality, so what she's like on the inside, her challenges that she faces, and how others start to support her.

When we write a character description, we can describe Ada's personality and her appearance.

So imagine this is Ada.

Her appearance is what she looks like.

So her hair, her face, her clothes.

Her expression, maybe, on her face.

And her personality is the type of person that she is.

So, true or false? Your appearance describes what you look like.

Can you get your thumbs ready? Is that true or false? I'm going to give you five seconds.

I can see lots of thumbs up.

That is true.

Your appearance describes what you look like on the outside.

So let's start by describing Ada's appearance.

Have a look at Ada Twist on the front cover.

Can you think of any expanded noun phrases to describe Ada? An expanded noun phrase, you've got adjective comma, adjective noun.

So for example, you might think about what she's wearing, red comma, spotty dress.

Pause the video and try and think of some expanded noun phrases to describe Ada.

Mm-mm-mm.

Off you go.

Well done.

Here's some that I came up with.

Ada has brown comma, curly hair, yellow comma, round bobbles, clear comma, plastic goggles, red comma, spotty dress, bright comma, excited eyes, curious comma, interested expression.

Maybe you could take a photo of your favourite expanded noun phrase.

Get your camera.

(mimics camera shutter clicking) Well done.

One more: Long comma, white socks.

We can put those ideas into sentences.

A sentence we know needs to make complete sense on its own and include a verb.

We know that a verb is a being or a doing word.

"Ada Twist has.

." "Ada wears.

"She looks.

." "Has," "wears" and "looks" are our verbs.

"Wears" and "looks" are doing words and "has" is a being word.

Starting our sentences in different ways helps to make our writing less repetitive.

You've got "Ada Twist" or just "Ada," or, once you've introduced the character's name, you could swap it for "she." Here are two phrases in two sentences.

"Ada Twist has," then my expanded noun phrase, "brown, curly hair." Full stop.

"She has yellow, round bobbles." Full stop.

My sentences have: a noun.

We have "hair," we have "bobbles," and we have "Ada Twist" and "she." We have verbs: "Has" are our verbs.

And we have expanded noun phrases.

"Brown, curly hair." "Yellow, round bobbles." Every sentence must make sense on its own and include a verb.

So, let's see what we remember.

A sentence must: make sense on its own, include an adjective, include a verb, start with a capital letter, and end with a punctuation mark such as a full stop.

Pause the video now and think about the ones that a sentence must have.

Off you go.

Let's see.

A sentence must: make sense on its own, include a verb and start with a capital letter, and end with a punctuation mark.

A sentence might include an adjective, but it does not have to.

For example, "I can see stars in the sky." There's no adjective there.

But it's great to add adjectives in to add more detail.

But sentences don't have to have them.

We can join those simple sentences together to create a compound sentence because the two ideas are related to each other, they're both about Ada's appearance.

We can use the joining word "and" to help us to do that.

"Ada Twist wears clear, plastic goggles.

She wears a red, spotty dress." At the moment, those are two great simple sentences.

Capital letter, "Ada Twist wears clear comma, plastic goggles." Full stop.

Capital letter.

"She wears a red comma, spotty dress." Full stop.

But I want to join those two ideas together using the joining word "and." Can you do that with me? The joining word "and." Fantastic.

So let's see if we can do that.

"Ada Twist wears clear comma, plastic goggles and she wears a red, spotty dress." So not only have we added "and" but that "and" has done something really important that we need to remember.

That "and" has replaced the first full stop after "goggles" because we are making one sentence, so we don't need the full stop.

And the second capital letter.

Can you see "she" no longer has a capital letter? And that is because we have formed one sentence.

Today you will write descriptive compound sentences to describe Ada's appearance.

Here's what you need to include: I have used expanded noun phrases to describe a character's appearance.

"Brown, curly hair.

"Yellow, round bobbles." I have joined two ideas together using "and." I have used a capital letter to start my sentence and a full stop to end my sentence.

I have read back my writing to make sure it makes sense.

Let's see if this sentence has met our success criteria: "Ada Twist has bright, excited eyes and she has a curious, interested expression." You can see that in this sentence, "she has a" sometimes to make my writing make sense.

And when we're talking about one thing, we might add "a" or "an." So let's see what I've included.

I have got expanded noun phrases: "bright, excited, eyes, curious, interested expression." I have joined two ideas together using "and," but oh, have I punctuated it correctly? Let's see.

I have joined my ideas, but let's see.

I have started my sentence with a capital letter, "Ada" which needs a capital letter anyway because it's a proper noun, and I have ended it with a full stop.

But I can see a random capital letter in the middle of my sentence.

Can you see it? In the word "she." (gasps) Before, "she has a curious interested expression" could be a sentence on its own.

But I have used the joining word "and" to join it together.

The word "and" takes away my first full stop and my next capital letter.

So I need to change that to a lowercase "she".

And I read my writing back to make sure it makes sense.

"Ada Twist has bright, excited eyes and she has a curious, interested expression." Fantastic.

I will use the expanded noun phrases to create compound sentences to describe Ada's appearance.

Here are the ones that we've had already: I'm going to choose "red, spotty dress" and "curious, interested expression." I'm going to put it into a sentence.

"Ada wears a red, spotty dress and she has a curious, interested expression." Can you plan your compound sentence? Start with either "Ada" or "Ada Twist".

Say "wears", "has", "looks".

Give your expanded noun phrase and then join it to another idea.

Pause the video and off you go.

Fantastic.

Did you plan your sentence? Have you got it in your head? Well done.

You are going to use the word bank to write a compound sentence to describe Ada Twist's appearance.

Challenge yourself to see if you can do more than one.

So start with your sentence starter: Ada Twist, Ada, or she.

Then think about your verb: has, looks, wears.

Then have your expanded noun phrases.

Have a think about whether you need to include "a" or "an" with it too.

For example, "Ada Twist has clear, plastic goggles and she wears a red, spotty dress." Full stop.

Have a go at writing some compound sentences all about Ada Twist's appearance.

Maybe you could think of your own expanded noun phrases.

Pause the video and off you go.

Fantastic.

Let's have a look at some of the sentences that I've seen.

"Ada Twist has bright, excited eyes and she has a curious, interested expression." "Ada has a red, spotty dress and she wears long, white socks." Let's see if those meet are success criteria.

Can you see expanded noun phrases? I can see "bright, excited eyes," "curious, interested expression," "red, spotty dress and long, white socks." Have we joined two ideas together using "and"? "Ada Twist has bright, excited eyes and she has a curious, interested expression." "Ada has a red, spotty dress and she wears long, white socks." I have got a capital letter at the start of my sentence and I've joined my ideas together so I don't need another capital letter.

And I have my full stops at the end.

And we've read them back to make sure they make sense.

Can you now check the success criteria here to make sure that you have met it too? Pause the video now.

Fantastic.

Well done for meeting your success criteria.

Now let's move on to the second part of the lesson: Describing a character's personality.

Now we will describe Ada's personality.

This can include: what her character is like, what she enjoys, what she does, and how she does it.

So we're thinking about her personality and what she's like on the inside.

So let's see.

True or false? Get those thumbs ready.

Your personality describes what you look like.

Is that true or is that false? I'm going to give you five seconds.

Five.

And one.

Let me see.

I can see lots of thumbs down.

Your appearance describes what you look like, but your personality describes what you are like on the inside.

Let's have a look at what we know about Ada from the story.

We are going to use evidence from the story to explain our descriptions for her personality.

Hmm.

Let's have a look through.

We know that Ada did not speak until she was three years old.

She likes to look at the world around her.

She leaves a trail of chaos behind her.

She has lots in her head and she thinks about things carefully.

She loves to learn facts and she likes to ask lots of questions.

And we all know she is a brilliant scientist.

Is there anything else that you can think of that you know about Ada? Can you keep it in your head? Fantastic.

One more.

She is resilient and she does not give up, a very important one.

From reading the book and gathering the information about her, we can generate adjectives to describe her personality.

We know that adjectives describe nouns and Ada is a person, so she is a noun.

So we have got the noun, "Ada Twist." Ada is: curious, scientific, chaotic, inquisitive, which means she likes to think.

She's busy, she's excitable and she's resilient.

I know that Ada is curious because she's always asking questions.

I wonder how else we can explain why we know that Ada is those things? Can you explain why she is described in this way using the book to help you? I know that Ada is: scientific because she thinks of a hypothesis.

I know that Ada is busy because her mind never stops and she is always asking questions.

Can you choose an adjective and explain why she is that way? Maybe you could look back in the book to help you.

Pause the video now.

Fantastic thinking.

And I love that you've used evidence from the book to help you.

Well done.

To write sentences, we must include verbs.

So we have our adjectives, but we need some verbs.

Let's think about some of the things she does and then add adverbs to show how she does them.

Here are my verbs: She climbs, she asks, she experiments, she investigates, and she speaks, lots and lots.

Our adverbs describe or add detail to our verbs.

Let's have a look at some of them: She climbs dangerously.

She asks curiously.

She experiments excitedly.

She investigates happily.

She speaks quickly.

She doesn't stop.

Could you think of another adverb maybe, for any of those verbs? She climbs bravely.

She asks inquisitively.

She experiments carefully.

She investigates excitedly.

She speaks furiously.

We can use adverbs to describe our verbs, but think really carefully about which ones we're going to choose.

Adverbs, we know add more detail to verbs.

And these adverbs are these type of adverbs that describe how the verb is done.

And you can see that they often end in LY.

We can generate a word bank to help us create sentences about Ada's personality.

'Cause we've got our adjectives, we've got our verbs, and now we've got our adverbs.

Let's see if we can put them all in.

We've got our adjectives: curious, scientific, chaotic, inquisitive, busy, excitable.

And if you could think of any others, that's great.

We've got our verbs, things she likes to do: climbs, speaks, asks, experiments, investigates.

And we've got our adverbs: curiously, dangerously, happily, excitedly, quickly.

I wonder which ones you are going to choose.

Now, before we write our sentence, let's double check that we know which word is each word class or type.

I have got an adjective, verb, and adverb.

And I need you to match it to the words.

The words are: climbs, chaotically, busy.

Which are each? Which word class are each of those words? Pause the video now.

Let's see if you got it.

Which is the adjective describing a noun? Ada is climbs? Ada is chaotically? Ada is busy.

The verb.

Which is the action, the thing that Ada does? Climbs or chaotically? She climbs.

And the adverb describes how things are done, often ending in LY.

Chaotically.

Well done if you got that.

So you are going to write now, descriptive compound sentences, but this time to describe Ada's personality.

So here are our success criteria.

I have used an adjective to describe a character's personality.

I have joined two ideas together using "and." I have used an adverb and a verb.

Oh, a verb and an adverb to describe what a character does.

And I have read back my writing to make sure it makes sense.

I think we can do that using our word bank.

Have a look at my sentence.

"Ada Twist is curious and she climbs dangerously." First, I have named her and described her using an adjective for my first idea.

"Ada Twist is curious." That's a full, complete idea on its own because "is" is my being verb.

Next I have used the joining word "and" to join my next idea.

"And she climbs dangerously." So I have explained what she does, she climbs, and added more detail using an adverb.

Let's spot them.

So "Ada Twist is curious," there's my adjective.

"and," there's my joining word, "climbs" is my verb, "dangerously is my adverb.

"Ada Twist is curious and she climbs dangerously." So has this sentence met our success criteria? I have used an adjective to describe a character's personality.

Let's read it to see.

"Ada Twist is inquisitive.

She experiments excitedly." "Ada Twist is inquisitive." There's my adjective.

I have used two ideas together.

Use, I have joined two ideas together using "and." "Ada Twist is inquisitive." Full stop.

Capital letter.

"She experiments excitedly." Full stop.

I've got my two ideas.

But are they joined together? No.

Let's see if we can fix that.

(gasps) There we go.

"Ada Twist is inquisitive," take away my full stop, "and," take away my capital letter, "she experiments excitedly." Now I've got it.

I have used a verb and an adverb to describe what a character does.

"Ada twist is inquisitive and she experiments," that's our verb, "excitedly." That's our adverb.

I have read back my writing to make sure it makes sense.

And that's really lucky that we read it back because otherwise, we wouldn't have joined our ideas together.

Now you are going to use the word bank to write a descriptive compound sentence about Ada's personality.

"Ada Twist is.

." adjective "and she.

." verb, adverb, full stop.

And then maybe you could choose another sentence.

"Ada Twist is scientific and she asks curiously." Full stop.

"Ada Twist is busy and she speaks quickly." Have a think about what your sentences are going to be and then write them.

Pause the video now.

Fantastic.

Let's see.

Here are some of the sentences that I've seen.

"Ada Twist is chaotic and she investigates curiously.

(gasps) I love that.

"Ada is excitable and she speaks quickly." Let's check them with our success criteria.

I have used an adjective to describe a character's personality.

"Ada Twist is chaotic." "Ada is excitable." I have joined two ideas together using "and." "Ada Twist is chaotic and she investigates curiously." "Ada is excitable and she speaks quickly." I have used a verb and an adverb to describe what a character does.

"She investigates," verb.

"She speaks," verb.

"She investigates curiously." Adverb.

"She speaks quickly." Adverb.

And we have read those sentences back.

Can you now follow that same process with your compound sentence or sentences? Pause the video now.

Well done.

Did you manage to meet your success criteria? Fantastic job.

An amazing lesson today.

I loved that we managed to use evidence from the book to write a really clear character description.

So we now know that a character description can be generated using evidence from the text.

For example, we know that Ada is curious because she asks lots of questions.

Adjectives can be used to describe a character's personality and appearance.

Adverbs can add detail to those actions or verbs of characters.

And two related ideas can be joined together using the joining word "and." Thank you so much for learning with me today, and I really hope you're proud of your amazing descriptions.

I hope to you again soon.

Bye!.