Lesson video

Hi there.

My name is loop Smith, and today we're going to be doing some English together.

In today's lesson, we're going to be editing the appearance paragraph on non chronological report all about the anglerfish.

So, let's make a start.

Here's the agenda for today's lesson.

First of all, look at and discuss the purpose of editing.

Then we'll look at and explore and editing checklist, which will help us edit before finally having a go for ourselves and editing our appearance paragraph.

In this lesson, you will need an exercise book or paper and coloured pencil, and you're writing your appearance Paragraph writing.

If you need to go off and get any of these things, pause the video now.

Okay.

So let's think about why we edit, why do we edit? I'd like you to have a think, see how many reasons you can come up with the best question.

Why do we edit? Pause the video now? Okay.

So there are a variety of reasons for editing.

It's very useful if done properly, if done correctly.

The first reason is it gives you a chance to reread and reflect on our own writing, which is really nice.

First and foremost, it's nice to read back what you've done and appreciate it.

Appreciate the hard work you put into it and appreciate the things you achieved with it.

It gives us a chance to identify what we've done well.

So what are those things you've done really, really well in your writing, we'll be able to talk about and think about today.

Also you get to identify areas for improvement, which is also so satisfying finding those little areas, which we can still improve on and work on, and actually working on them.

That's really beneficial.

And it only goes to help our future writing.

We can correct errors.

You can make any necessary changes and we can make conditions, so we can add things in it's not just about taking things out or fixing things.

It's about adding in new things.

So, our editing checklist, this helps us think about the most important things to focus on when editing.

First it's worth considering the criteria we used when we wrote.

When we wrote the appearance paragraph, we use this set of criteria.

I have included in opening and linking sentences.

I've included brackets to add extra information.

I've included a formal conjunction and subject specific vocabulary.

I've referred to nouns in different ways.

So when we wrote, we were writing, using this set of criteria as guidelines.

When we edit, we need to think about errors to check for.

What errors, do you think we need to check for when looking at our writing? Pause the video and have a think.

okay.

When we check our writing, we need to consider possible errors or punctuation of sense.

So this is when the writing actually doesn't make sense, which is surprisingly common.

It's an easy thing to happen, but fortunately it's an easy thing to fix.

spell it.

So we need to keep an eye out for misspellings.

How about improvement when it comes to making improvements, what are we looking for? What improvements do we need to make positive? Okay.

So when we look to improve writing, we're looking for language choices.

We're always asking ourselves, have we made the best possible language choice in this instance? If the answer is no, that's great because that means you have a chance to improve it.

Sentence types with aiming to very centred type in order to maintain flow between sentences.

This is something else we keep our eyes peeled for structure.

We want to make sure that our writing has a coherent structure.

structure that makes sense and is easy to read.

Okay.

So I think it's about time that we practise editing for ourselves.

First thing we're going to do is begin to check for errors.

So we're looking at punctuation errors, errors of scent and spelling errors.

So we've got a piece of writing to work on.

You're going to help me edit that first and then you'll have a chance to edit your own work.

Here's the piece of writing weekend to edit.

Now you can see it in the corner.

We have a reminder of the things to focus on punctuation, sense and spelling.

I'm going to read the writing out very carefully and slowly.

You're going to help me identify any mistakes fast to fix.

If there's something you spot, feel free to shout it out, to make a note on it.

And let's see if we can pick up on everything that has gone wrong.

I think we can.

So, appearance, the anglerfish is known for its distinctive appearance and range or interesting adaptations.

Well, the first thing I've noticed is the word it's now.

And it's that contains an apostrophe is a contraction of the two words.

It is the anglerfish is known for it is distinctive appearance.

Well, no, that's definitely not the type of hits I'm after here in this instance, I'm looking for possessions.

So I want it to be clear that the distinctive appearance belongs to the anglerfish.

When that's the case, it does not contain an apostrophe, F4 in this instance I've used the wrong kits, which is very common.

Now, the reason it's so common it's because often you do use an apostrophe to show possession, but not in this instance.

So, anglerfish is known for its distinctive appearance and range of interesting annotations.

Now something doesn't look right about the word appearance.

Often when something's misspelt, you can rely on your gut instinct to tell you that it doesn't look right, now fortunately, we actually already have the word appearance spelled correctly as our subheading.

So I can compare with that appearance.

Well, in this instances, I can see that the wrong ear sound has been used.

The double e-version, word appearance contains the ear sound spelled E A R, just like your ear.

To remember Maybe you can think that your ear is part of your appearance.

That's a useful tip.

Let's change that.

Deceptive appearance and range of interesting adaptations.

Okay.

Next sentence.

Fascinatingly, this deadly predator has a long, 20 centimetre bioluminescent new approach intruding from their heads.

There are a few things, which again, don't sound right.

Now this is why it's so important to read your work out loud, Because it's often only when you read it out loud that you start to hear some of these quite obvious mistakes.

First thing I notice is this lovely sentence, Arthur, what we might call an L Y sentence starter.

It's an artefact fascinatingly.

Now, L Y sentence starters are always followed by a comma.

So, let's add that in fascinatingly, this deadly predator has a long brackets, 20 centimetre.

Now I love that we have some brackets here, open brackets to contain the extra information.

And I'm scanning along to look for the close brackets and I can't see it.

So let's fix that, whenever you open a set of brackets, it's important that you close them and it's important that you close in the right place.

Now, in this instances, the extra information is just length of the law.

So that's the only bit of information that needs to be kept within the brackets.

So, my close bracket goes here.

20 centimetre, bioluminescent lure, protruding from their heads.

Let's read the sentence as a whole.

I think we're almost there with it.

Fascinatingly, this deadly predator has a long 20 centimetre bioluminescent lure protruding from their heads.

We have a clash, this is called a clash of agreement.

At the beginning of the sentence, I refer to this deadly predator, singular.

I'm talking about there being one of them.

I'm talking actually in a general sense about the anglerfish singular.

I'm not talking about more than one.

However, towards the back end of the sentence, it sounds as though I am talking about more than one bioluminescent lure protruding from their heads that suggests there are lots of them.

Whenever you're talking about a species, you have to be very clear whether or not it was talking about one of them in a general sense, which is fine to do, or if you're talking about lots of them, which is also fine to do.

Whichever you pick, you have to be consistent with, in this instance I've started the sentence using the singular form, so I'm going to maintain that throughout the sentence.

Fascinatingly, this deadly predator has a long 20 centimetre bioluminescent lure protruding from its head.

Since I'm only talking about one of them, I can only refer to it's one head.

Okay that's much better, It sounds better.

It looks better.

Next sentence.

This peculiar feature enables it to attract unsuspecting prey into its great waiting jaws.

Furthermore, this unique adaptation allows it to navigate them murky waters of the deep, So really beautiful sentences and there's lots to be proud about here.

I've got lovely phrases, such as peculiar feature.

We've got lovely verbs, such as attract.

It's a nice adjectives like unsuspecting.

There is one formal conjunction here, which I'm very impressed with furthermore, something's not quite right though.

Now what do we need after furthermore, in fact, what do we need after all four conjunctions? A comma.

So let's add that in formal conjunctions come at the beginning of sentences and they are followed by comments.

By the more comma, is unique adaptation allows it to navigate the murky waters of the deep.

Lovely So there we have a much improved piece of writing and you'll have noticed that lots of those mistakes were actually quite straight forward and they were easy to pick up on, as soon as we read them out loud.

So we've checked for punctuation, sense and spell it.

Now it's time for you to have a go.

I let you to pause the video to complete this task.

Just a quick reminder, you're editing your appearance paragraph to do this You'll have to reread it.

Then check for errors or punctuation sense and spelling.

Pause the video now and have a go.

Okay.

Next up, we're making improvements.

We're looking out for the language choice, sentence type and structure, and it's in these areas that we're going to make improvements.

So this is the piece of writing we are going to be trying to improve in the corner you'll see is our checklist.

This will remind us of the things we're focusing on.

Language choices, sentence, types, and structure.

I'm going to read the writing out first and then we'll see if we can figure out what could be improved and why, why that's necessary.

Appearance.

The anglerfish has a lot of features that help it survive in its home.

This scary monster is known for its weird appearance.

It has a lure protruding from its head.

It has excellent eyesight.

It can locate prey.

Okay.

So there are lots of good things about this piece of writing.

Firstly, it includes almost all of the information that we need.

So in terms of content is pretty good.

The problem is it doesn't really flow that well when I read it out loud, there's not much cohesion, which means the sentences don't stick together very nicely.

We want our writing to flow.

Well, it needs to sound good.

If it does, the reader is more likely to read it and they're more likely to carry on reading it.

That's key, that's really important.

So we can do better.

The first sentence, the anglerfish has a lot of features that help it survive in its home is a general opening sentence.

The first thing that jumps out to me is this term is phrase a lot of that's what you might call a very colloquial way of saying a variety of when I say colloquial, I mean it's a kind of everyday phrase, which you might use out on the street when you bump into somebody or at home or in school, but this is a scientific report.

So I think we need to do better.

We should go for a variety of, or a range of, I think both of those work equally well.

let me think, i think I'm going to go for a variety of anglerfish has a variety of features that help it survive in it's home.

It's home.

Well, yeah, we are talking about it's home.

We know a scientific word for home, which is even better and it's definitely more appropriate.

Wonder if you could remember what it is.

I'm going to give you a few seconds.

It begins with H it's habitats.

The anglerfish has a variety of features that help it survive in its habitat.

Well, yes, we're talking about its habitat, but actually what we could do here is we could start to describe its habitat.

We know it lives in a difficult habitat and we have a few words that we've learned, which describes conditions that are difficult to live in.

We have harsh, we have hostile and we have inhospitable.

I'd like you to pick your favourite of those three and I'm going to pick mine.

Okay.

My favourite is in hospital.

The habitat is inhospitable.

It's a difficult place to live and there are lots of things which are suggesting which are making you want to go elsewhere.

In hospital this scary monster, is known for weird appearance.

Now yes in some people's opinion, it is a scary monster.

And in some people's opinion, it does have a weird appearance.

But when we write the formal report, are we using people's opinions or are we using scientific fact? Yeah! Scientific fact.

So these opinions need to go scary is not appropriate.

Even Monster's not appropriate and weird is definitely not appropriate.

So, let's see if we can do better.

To replace scary monster, let's come up with a synonym for anglerfish.

I'm going to give you a few seconds to have a go.

and I'm going to think of one or two.

I'm going to say fascinating species.

It's fascinating Species is known for its weird appearance.

Now, we already decided we can't use that.

There is a more formal equivalent for the word weird, which is bizarre.

It's fair to say that it has a bizarre appearance.

It's fascinating.

Species is known for its bizarre appearance.

Okay.

Now it's from this point onward that it starts to get a bit clunky and clumsy.

It has a nerve protruding from its head, it has excellent eyesight, it can locate prey.

Well, to me that almost sounds like a list.

I think we can be better than that in terms of flow.

This first sentence, it has a lure intruding from its head.

I think we should go for an L Y sentence starter.

What could we go for? I'm going to give you three options.

Fascinatingly, interestingly, intriguingly and actually I've just thought of a bonus option.

Now this is not an L Y sentence starter.

However, I think it sounds very appropriate.

Scientists have discovered that.

I think that's a really nice one.

So we could try that, that type of thing.

I'll let you to pick your favourite option.

I'm going to pick mine.

I'm going for the scientists one.

It's just coming to me in the last few seconds, but I think it's really nice.

So, scientists have discovered that they love tuning from its head.

Wow!.

That sounds really, really formal.

That sounds like the exact kind of language.

You might find it in a nonfiction text.

It has excellent eyesight.

Well, this is interesting, cause this is like an addition.

So we're like adding onto its bizarre appearance.

We've said it as a bizarre appearance.

We've given one reason and now we're giving another reason.

I think a really nice way of adding extra information, while maintaining flow is with a formal conjunction.

So, since this is additional information, I think we need a formal and conjunction.

We could go with furthermore, we could go with moreover or also, or in addition, I like to pick your favourite.

I'm going to pick mine.

I'm going to go for moreover.

I don't know what it is about moreover, but it just sounds very, I don't know.

It sounds nice.

It sounds formal.

It sounds grown up and I think it sounds appropriate.

Moreover, it has excellent eyesight.

Okay.

And our last sentence, it can locate prey.

What's interesting.

Cause this does link to the previous sentence, because after all it's the eyesight which allows it to locate prey.

So maybe we could use a causal conjunction.

For example, as a result, it can locate pray where in its, I guess in its habitat, but we've already said habitat.

Tell me what let's make a stop.

And I think that bit at the sentence, we can improve in a second as a result comma, it can locate prey in its and we're not going to say habitat path.

We learned a word which would be perfect for this territory.

I wonder if you've got that one too.

Okay.

So here we have a much improved piece of writing Let's just check it.

The amphitheatre has a variety of features that help it survive in it's inhospitable habitat is fascinating Species is known for its bizarre appearance.

Scientists have discovered that it has a lure protruding from its head.

Moreover, it has excellent eyesight as a result It can locate prey in its territory.

Wow! That is a huge improvement, I think we've done really well there.

Okay, excellent.

Let's have a closer look at exactly what we've done.

We have made these improvements.

We've looked at language choices, sentence types, and structure.

And now it's your turn.

I'd like you to pause the video, have a go with your own appearance paragraph.

Remember we're looking to make improvements of language choice, sentence types and structure.

Pause the video now and have it go.

Okay.

And that's the end of the lesson.

Today we have looked at the purpose of editing.

We've gone through our editing checklist and then we've had to go together editing ourselves.

You've done a really good job.

Well done for all of your hard work.

You've completed your lesson.