Lesson video

Hello everyone, my name is Mr. Brown, and today we're going to be editing, editing your climax and a pre-written resolution for the animated story "Otherwise." Editing is such an important part of the writing process and I know you are going to make your writing even better by editing it today.

So let's get started.

The outcome for today's lesson is I can edit the climax and resolution of "Otherwise." The keywords we'll use are editing and punctuation.

Let's say those together, my turn and then your turn.

Editing.

Punctuation.

Fabulous, now editing is the process of making any changes needed to improve our writing, and punctuation is the name for the marks used to make our sentences clearer and easier to read.

We'll start today's lesson by editing punctuation and then move on to editing words.

Here is the story of "Otherwise" structured on a story staircase.

In this lesson, we are editing the climax and the resolution.

The purpose of the resolution is to do these things.

Resolve the problem of the main character.

End the story with everything now resolved.

Here's an example of the resolution for "Otherwise." "Suddenly, Anders realised he had climbed into the eagle's nest and saw the horrifying bird right in front of him.

Surprisingly, the eagle seemed shocked by Anders and flew away.

Anders had saved the other chameleon.

The green chameleons warmly hugged each other and left Anders on his own again.

Just then, the chameleon Anders had saved grabbed his hand and invited him to join them.

Anders felt ecstatic and joyfully skipped off to play with his new friends." Lovely, that's a resolution.

We have tied up all the loose ends, we have resolved the problems in the story, and it's a happy ending.

Let's check your understanding.

The purpose of the resolution is to, A, create more problems for the main character.

B, resolve the problem of the main character.

C, end the story with everything now resolved.

Or D, describe the setting.

Pause the video and decide now.

And welcome back, let's see if you managed to get this correct.

The purpose of the resolution is to resolve the problem of the main character and end the story with everything now resolved.

Well done if you said B and C.

We definitely don't want to create more problems for the main character, and describing the setting, well, that happens in the opening.

Editing is the process of making any changes needed to improve our writing.

When you edit, you decide what you will change and what you will keep the same.

Even very successful writers need and want to edit their work.

Editing doesn't mean rewriting everything again.

It's about making certain corrections and improvements.

The job of an editor is to check for mistakes in punctuation.

So this is an actual job, you could be an editor, and you'll be checking for mistakes in punctuation, making improvements in word choices.

And in this lesson, you are going to be editors, you're actually going to do this task.

Editing is the process of, is it A, rewriting a whole piece of text.

B, checking for punctuation errors.

C, making improvements in word choices.

Or D, writing the text again with better handwriting.

Editing is the process of, what do you think? Pause the video and decide now.

And welcome back.

Editing is the process of B, checking for punctuation errors, and C, making improvements in word choices.

Well done if you said B and C.

One of the main things you'll be checking in editing is punctuation.

Punctuation is the name for the symbols and marks used to make our sentences clearer and easier to read.

This includes all the punctuation you already know, like capital letters, full stops, commas, exclamation marks and question marks.

When we edit, we will edit mistakes with capital letters, full stops and commas.

These are the things that we are going to be focusing on.

Can you spot the missing or incorrect capital letters in this sentence? What do you think? Feel free to pause the video and discuss with your partner.

Okay, let's have a look, shall we? Well done if you spotted that there is a missing capital letter at the beginning of the sentence.

A missing capital letter for a name.

That's a proper noun, that's Anders, it should have a capital letter.

And an incorrect capital letter, a capital letter that is there but should not be there.

Capital letters are used at the beginning of sentences and to begin proper nouns.

We will check if there's a capital letter at the beginning of every sentence and at the start of a name.

If there isn't, we will edit one and improve it.

That's what editing is all about.

Okay, here we have another sentence.

"Suddenly, Anders realised he had climbed into the eagle's nest." We will do this by crossing out the mistake with a neat diagonal line and adding the edit just above.

So for example we can see we have missed a capital letter at the start, so let's cross that out and then let's put a capital S above, and there we are.

Again the same for Anders, no capital letter.

Let's cross out the little one and put the capital letter there.

We then look to see if there are any other capital letters that have been used incorrectly in the sentence.

Can you see any capital letters that have been used incorrectly? Again, we do this if we spot a mistake by crossing it out with a neat diagonal line and adding the edit just above.

So there is a problem, there is a capital M that shouldn't be there.

I've just crossed that out and let's add a little M directly above.

How do we cross out a mistake? Is it A, with a big red cross, or just a big cross, rather.

B, with a neat diagonal line.

Or C, by scribbling over the mistake.

How do we cross out a mistake? Pause the video and decide now.

Welcome back, how do we cross out a mistake? It is, of course, with a neat diagonal line.

No big cross, no scribbling out.

Editing for punctuation errors also means finding mistakes with full stops.

In a narrative, we expect most sentences to end with a full stop.

We check every sentence to see if it has a full stop.

For example, this sentence.

"Joyfully, Anders skipped along with the others." Capital letter, yeah, oh oh, no full stop.

There's no full stop at the end of this sentence.

If a full stop is missing, we edit one in.

Okay, let me just pop one in.

Ah, there it is, we now have a full stop.

We must also check that there are no full stops in the wrong place in a sentence.

So it's not just about checking the end, but are there any that shouldn't be there at all? Let's have a look at this one.

"Surprisingly, full stop." That shouldn't be a full stop, it should be a comma after surprisingly.

Okay, yeah, that's a full stop in the middle of a sentence.

That needs to be edited by crossing out and then we can leave it or we can add any punctuation if we need to replace it instead.

Which of these sentences uses a full stop correctly? Is it A, "Anders climbed into the nest, full stop, and saw the eagle above him, full stop." Is it B, "The eagle seemed startled by Anders and flew away into the sky." Or is it C, "The green chameleons all hugged and left Anders on his own, full stop." What do you think? Which of these sentences uses a full stop correctly? Pause the video and decide now.

Welcome back, okay, let's have a look.

So the first sentence, we have a full stop at the end, but we also have one in the middle.

"Anders climbed into the nest, full stop." Absolutely, that's not correct, we do not need that full stop in the middle.

Let's look at B.

"The eagle seemed startled by Anders and flew away into the sky." A lovely full sentence, but no full stop at all.

Missing a full stop at the end.

C, "The green chameleons all hugged and left Anders on his own, full stop." It is C, well done if you said C.

A missing full stop for B and a full stop there shouldn't be there for A.

The last piece of punctuation to check is commas.

A comma is used after a fronted adverbial.

For example, "Suddenly, comma." Between adjectives and expanded noun phrases.

For example, "Sharp, comma, pointy talons." If we see a comma is missing, then we edit one in by following the same steps as we followed with the previous punctuation that we've looked at.

Which two of these sentences are missing commas? Is it A, "Suddenly Anders reached the eagle's nest"? Is it B, "Anxiously, Anders ran away from the angry green chameleons"? Or C, "Joyfully, Anders and the other chameleons skipped off into the leafy, green jungle." Now, I haven't read the commas out, I want you to read them through yourself and check carefully which two of these sentences are missing commas.

Pause the video and decide now.

And welcome back, okay, let's have a look.

So A, B, or C.

Well, well done if you said A, because it's missing a comma after suddenly.

Suddenly is a fronted adverbial of manner.

And C, "Joyfully, Anderson and the other chameleons skipped off into the leafy, green jungle." Leafy and green are adjectives, they're describing the jungle, that's an expanded noun phrase, they should have a comma there therefore, which means A and C are the correct answers.

Time for a task.

Edit the punctuation in your climax by reading through carefully and slowly.

Check for the following things one at a time.

Capital letters used only at the start of each sentence and for any proper nouns, so people's names.

Full stops at the end of each sentence.

Commas only used after fronted adverbials and between adjectives and expanded noun phrases.

If you see anything that needs to be edited, add it in.

If you spot anything that needs to be removed, put a neat diagonal line through the mistake.

Now, if you do not have your own climax, you can use these three sentences.

So edit the punctuation in these three sentences if you do not have your own climax to edit.

Okay, it's over to you.

Pause the video and edit your climax, all these three sentences now.

Welcome back, everyone.

Let's take a look at these three sentences and how they can be edited.

So first of all we look for the capital letters used only at the start of each sentence and for any proper nouns.

So we have, oh yeah, number three, there is a capital letter missing at the start, so let's cross that out and put the capital letter in.

Any other capital letters? Ah yeah, there in number two, we've got a couple that should not be there, that capital K in the word rocky.

So let's cross that out and put a little K there.

And we have of course, ah, capital letter for Anders, A, because it's proper noun.

Great, so that's all ticked off, we can now look at full stops at the end of each sentence.

Okay, start with number one.

Ah, doesn't have full stop, let's put it in.

Number two does, number three does, so that's okay, we can tick that off.

And commas used after fronted adverbials and between two adjectives.

So after fronted adverbials, nervously has one, desperately does not, let's put that in.

Just then does one.

In between two adjectives, "sprinted away from the angry, determined chameleons." They are two adjectives, angry and determined describe the chameleons, which means it should have a comma in between, let's put that in.

Clambered up, yeah, that does.

Number three, turned around to see, yeah, that's good, okay, we can tick that off.

Let's move on to editing words.

When we edit word choices, we carefully review and make changes to the words in our writing.

Editing word choices in a narrative can have a big impact on our writing by improving how descriptive it is.

When editing, make sure to do the following.

Check that word choices are descriptive and choose words that are ambitious.

True or false? Once words are written, we should not change them.

Is that true or is that false? Pause the video and decide now.

Welcome back, once words are written, we should not change them is absolutely false.

Of course we can edit and improve our word choice at any time.

In our narrative writing, we want the adjectives chosen to be ambitious and descriptive.

We also want the verbs and adverbs chosen to be precise, to ensure the reader can picture exactly what is happening at each moment.

Verbs are the words used to tell the reader what is happening, and adverbs are the words that tell the reader how a verb happened.

For example, "Anders ran quickly up the rocky mountain." Ran is the verb, quickly is the adverb.

There are more precise verbs that we can use, though.

For example, sprinted, darted, or dashed.

They're all more precise than ran.

So we could cross out ran and change it to darted, for example.

And quickly, there are more precise adverbs, like desperately, frantically, relentlessly.

Quickly doesn't tell us how he is feeling, whereas desperately, relentlessly, frantically tell us that he was moving quickly and it tells us how he was feeling.

So I'm gonna cross out quickly and change that to frantically, so, "Anders darted frantically up the rocky mountains." True or false, verbs are the words used to tell the reader what is happening.

Is that true or false? Pause the video and decide now.

Welcome back, okay, so it's true, well done if you said true, verbs are the words that tell the reader what is happening.

They are the action words, the doing words.

Now adjectives, they help to create a clear picture.

Adjectives should be precise to help the reader picture exactly what we are describing.

"The green chameleons looked at Anders with their big eyes." Now big, that's not very descriptive, is it? There are more precise adjectives we could use, like wide, furious, rage-filled.

So I'd cross out big and replace it with two adjectives, wide and furious.

We always want to try and use two adjectives to give as much description as we can.

Time for a task.

I'd like you to the verbs, adverbs, and adjectives in your climax.

You need to find the verbs, adverbs, and adjectives in each sentence.

That's the first thing you need to do, find them.

Then decide if they can be edited and improved to be more precise.

Put a neat diagonal line through the word you do not want and write the word you want instead above.

Here is an example of a resolution.

If you do not have your own climax to edit, you can edit my resolution.

If you have completed your own climax, then edit my resolution as well.

So I'll read it to you.

"Anders realised he had got into the big eagle's nest and saw the horrifying bird right in front of him.

Slowly, the eagle was startled and gently flew away into the sky.

Anders had saved the chameleon, but the others left him alone again.

The red lizard sat still and looked at the others running off together." Okay, pause the video, edit your climax and my resolution.

Have a go now.

And welcome back, let's have a look at the edits that you might have spotted.

Well done if you spotted that got was not very descriptive verb.

"Anders realised he had got into the big eagle's nest." No, "Anders realised he had accidentally climbed into the big eagle's nest," that's much more descriptive.

Now big, of course, is definitely an adjective that we can improve upon, so I've crossed big out and replacing that with "giant, terrifying eagle," that's much better.

Slowly, I think I can improve upon that.

"Slowly, the eagle was startled." That isn't even accurate.

So he wasn't slowly startled, he was instantly startled.

So, "Instantly the eagle was startled and gently flew away." Again, not descriptive enough.

Frantically flew away.

We need to make sure that our word choices are descriptive but also they're accurate.

So I've got the red lizard, I'm crossing out red and replacing that with lonely because that tells us a bit more about how Anders is in this exact moment.

We know that he's red, he's been red throughout the entire story, so tell me something I don't know.

That's what I'm looking for from the adjectives.

And "the lonely lizard sat still and looked." Now I always think looked can be improved upon, there are a lot more words that are better than looked, so I'm going to use gazed.

"The lonely lizard sat still and gazed at the others running off together." Let's summarise the learning that we've done today.

Editing is the process of making any changes needed to improve our writing.

Punctuation is the name for the marks used to make our sentences clearer and easier to read.

When we edit word choices, we carefully review and make changes to the words in our writing.

Well done today for the excellent work in this lesson and in this entire unit.

I will see you again very soon.