Lesson video

Hi, I'm Mr. Buckingham, and I'm really delighted that you've decided to join me today to learn about punctuating direct speech.

Now, this is a tricky topic with a lot of very specific rules.

But I'm going to guide you through it step-by-step, and I'm sure that by the end of the lesson, you're going to feel really confident about this.

Let's make a start.

Today's lesson is called speech-first, and inverted commas and punctuation rules from our unit, Apostrophes and Speech Punctuation.

By the end of today's lesson, we are going to be able to accurately punctuate a speech-first sentence.

Here are the key words for today's lesson.

My turn, your turn.

Direct speech, speech-first sentence, reporting clause, inverted commas, and capital letter.

Let's look at those in a bit more detail.

We write direct speech to show that a character is speaking out loud in a text.

A speech-first sentence is one where we include direct speech first before the reporting clause.

Don't panic about that just yet.

The reporting clause are part of a sentence that tells the reader who said the speech, and how.

Inverted commas a pair of punctuation marks that signal/show direct speech to the reader.

And the last one, you already know, a capital letter is the uppercase formation of a letter.

Let's look at our lesson outline.

We're going to start by learning the rules for punctuating direct speech.

And then, we're going to be writing some speech-first sentences.

Let's start by learning those rules.

We use direct speech to show that a character's speaking out loud.

Here are some examples.

"What a lot of noise!" cried Miss Ofoedu.

"I just can't do it, Miss." sighed Jun sadly.

"Shall I help you?" Aisha asked kindly.

Now, we can see in purple, these are the words that the characters actually said out loud.

This is the direct speech.

And direct speech is shown to our reader using inverted commas, which look like this.

You can see they're high up on the line, not low down.

The inverted commas tell us where the words the character said begin and end.

If you look at Aisha's example, Aisha didn't say the words, Aisha asked kindly.

She only said, "Shall I help you?" So, the inverted commas go around those words.

Now, which of these examples uses direct speech to show exactly what a character said out loud? I wondered if we would make it through the harsh winter.

"What a cold winter we're having!" I cried in disbelief.

Had it worked? Were they finally free? "Let's go," muttered Andeep dejectedly.

Pause the video and decide which of these include direct speech.

Great effort, let's take a look.

The first one does not.

There are no inverted commas, there is no direct speech.

B has inverted commas.

That has direct speech.

C, no inverted commas, so it's not direct speech.

And D has those inverted commas around, "Let's go." Those are the exact words Andeep said, so this is direct speech.

Great effort.

Now, the inverted commas go around the words that were spoken out loud by the character, the direct speech.

For example, let's get our books, said Mr. Clarke calmly.

Currently, we don't have inverted commas.

But I can see the words that Mr. Clarke actually said are, let's get out our books.

So if you want to write this as direct speech, it's going to look like this.

I've put the inverted commas around, "Let's get out our books.", because those were the words Mr. Clarke said out loud.

So, this section is called the reporting clause, and it tells us who said the direct speech and how they said it.

Mr. Clarke said it.

He said it calmly.

Put the inverted commas around the words he actually said.

So, it looks like this.

WE have our first inverted commas, we have the speech, our second inverted commas, and then the reporting clause to say who said it and how.

Now, that's very basic to start off with.

We're going to make that picture much more detailed as we go through this lesson.

Now we need to look at the sentence below and decide which words are direct speech, the words that were said, and which are the reporting clause, the part which says who said it and how.

Here's our sentence.

We're going to be learning about ancient Egypt today, continued Mr. Clarke with a smile.

Pause the video and decide which words are direct speech, and which are the reporting clause.

Well done.

Hopefully you spotted that these are the words Mr. Clarke would've actually said.

So, if we're writing direct speech, it would look like this.

We've put the inverted commas around those words, "We're going to be learning about ancient Egypt today." And the rest of the sentence is the reporting clause, continued Mr. Clarke with a smile.

That tells us Mr. Clarke said it with a smile.

That's how he said it.

So, the direct speech always begins with a capital letter.

We can see the same examples here, and we've got a capital letter at the start of the direct speech.

So, we can add a bit more to our diagram.

We open our inverted comma, we have our capital letter, CL, capital letter, then the speech.

Then we close our inverted commas, a second set of inverted commas, and then comes the reporting clause.

Now, because the direct speech comes before the reporting clause in these three examples, we call this a speech-first sentence.

The speech comes before the reporting clause, and we'll learn another type in the next lesson.

So, in a speech-first sentence, the reporting clause only has a capital letter if it starts with the name of the person speaking.

So in our examples, we can see no caps letter there, no caps letter there, but we do have a cap letter here.

Because Aisha is a name, it will always have a capital letter.

So, we can see our same structure again.

Open the inverted commas, a capital letter at the start of the direct speech, then the speech, close the inverted commas, and then the reporting clause.

So, where should the inverted commas be placed in this sentence? And what else needs to be added? Time to get your coats! Miss Ofoedu bellowed loudly.

Pause the video and decide where should the inverted commas be, and what else might need to be added? Brilliant work.

Let's have a look.

This is the direct speech, the words Miss Ofoedu said.

So we need to put the inverted around that section.

It would look like this.

We've also had to add our capital letter for time because that's the first letter of the sentence, and it always is going to have a capital letter when the speech comes first.

Fantastic effort if you spotted both those things.

And this, of course, is the reporting clause.

We've got who is saying it, Miss Ofoedu.

And how? She bellowed loudly.

Now, there's always some closing punctuation at the end of the direct speech before the second set of inverted commas.

Let me show you what I mean.

We've got here are three examples again.

And in each one, we have some closing punctuation in purple.

In the first one, I've got an exclamation mark, because this is showing a strong emotion.

In the second one, I have a comma.

And we use a comma whenever we'd normally use a full stop.

There's no strong emotion here, it's more of a statement.

And the last one is easy.

Aishas asking a question, so we've used a question mark.

But we must always put some punctuation before that second set of inverted commas.

When the direct speech comes before the reporting clause, we never use a full stop at the end of the direct speech.

So, in a speech-first sentence, we will never have a full stop at the end of the direct speech.

Instead, we'll always do it this way.

Inverted commas open, then the capital letter, then the speech.

Then either an exclamation mark, a question mark, or a comma.

Then we close the inverted commas, then the reporting clause.

So if you think you would normally put a full stop, when the speech comes first, it's going to be a comma.

And in these speech-first sentences, there's always going to be a full stop at the end of the reporting clause.

Because, if you think about it, that's the end of the sentence.

So, we can add one last thing to our diagram here.

So, here's an example.

"What a lot of noise!" cried Miss Ofoedu.

We've got our reporting clause with its full stop at the end.

Now, I want you to decide which punctuation needs to be added to each sentence? We've got an exclamation mark, a comma, a question mark, and a full stop.

Each sentence needs two pieces of punctuation added.

Pause the video, and decide where they should go.

Great work.

In, you've got to be joking, we can see there's some strong emotion because we've got the word boomed in our reporting clause.

So, this is going to be an exclamation mark.

And, let's go to the park after school.

Aisha is speaking quietly.

There's no strong emotion here.

So, this would be a comma.

And in, will you be late home? That's a question, so it's going to be a question mark.

But wait, at the end of each reporting clause, we're going to need a full stop to show it's the end of the sentence.

There was lots to get there, so, well done if you managed it.

So, a speech-first sentence always follows the same steps.

Let's look at one all the way through with all the details.

"Find two spelling mistakes," demanded Mr. Clarke with a grin.

We started with our inverted commas, then the capital letter, then the speech, the direct speech, what Mr. Clarke actually said, then our closing punctuation, an exclamation mark, a question mark, or, in this case, a comma.

Then, we are closing our inverted commas.

Then we've got our reporting clause, and we are finishing with that full stop at the end of the reporting clause.

The reporting clause can start with either the speaker, or the said word.

Here, we've started with the said word, demanded Mr. Clarke with a grin.

But we could start with Mr. Clarke instead, the speaker.

Mr. Clarke demanded with a grin.

And you can see in that example we'll have the M of Mr. Clarke as a capital letter.

Now you try.

What needs to be added to this sentence to follow the rules for a speech-first sentence? Let's see your best work today, smiled Miss Ofoedu hopefully.

Now, there's an awful lot to add.

So, pause the video, and have a go at adding in all the missing steps.

Have a go.

Great effort.

Let's see how it should look.

Here's the finished example.

Let's talk it through.

We started with our inverted commas, then our capital letter, the L.

Then we've got the speech, what Miss Ofoedu actually said.

Then we've got our closing punctuation, a comma, our closing inverted commas, then the reporting clause, smiled Miss Ofoedu hopefully.

And we're finishing with that full stop.

If you managed to get all of those, you've done a great job.

Now, for your first task this lesson, I want you to rewrite each of these sentences, adding the inverted commas, the capital letters, and other punctuation marks that you need.

And I've left that diagram at the bottom of the screen to help you.

So, you've got five examples.

I'd like them to be written following the rules that we've just learned with our inverted commas, capital letters, and any other punctuation you think you need.

And remember, that closing punctuation might depend on the emotion that's shown in the sentence.

If it's a strong emotion, we may use an exclamation mark.

If it's a question, of course, we'll use a question mark.

And if we think it would normally be a full stop if it was a normal sentence, we'll use a comma instead when we've got the speech-first like this.

Pause the video, and have a try.

Okay, let's take a look.

Here is what our first sentence should look like.

We can see we've got the inverted commas, the capital letter, the closing exclamation mark, the closing inverted commas, and our full stop at the end.

Have a look at these other examples, and check that yours look the same.

You might want to think about our diagram at the bottom and check, have you got your opening inverted commas, your capital letter, your closing punctuation, your closing inverted commas? And then, after your reporting clause, your full stop? Really, well done if you think you've managed to get all of those features added in, because there's an awful lot to remember.

Great effort.

Okay, we've done an amazing job of learning those rules.

So, we're now going to move on to writing our own.

speech-first sentences.

Let's get going.

Now, when we write a speech-first sentence, we need to decide a few things.

We need to decide, first of all, who's speaking.

That's going to go in the reporting clause.

We need to decide what they say.

That will go in our direct speech.

We need to decide how to punctuate what they've said, which will depend on what they've said.

And we need to decide how they say it, which, again, will go in our reporting clause.

Here's an example.

"Can I help you?" asked Jun kindly.

Here we've included who's speaking, Jun.

We've included what they say, "Can I help you?" It's a question, so we've included how to punctuate it with a question mark.

And we've said how they say it, asked and kindly.

Which of the following do you think you're going to find in a speech-first sentence? Pause the video, and decide which of these would be present.

Well done.

Yes, it's going to include a reporting clause.

Yes, it will have a capital letter at the start of the direct speech, and it will have a pair of inverted commas and a full stop.

We won't usually, or always, have a capital letter at the start of the reporting clause.

We will only have that if it's the name of the person who is speaking.

Now, we need to make the speech that we write interesting for our reader.

So we can use different synonyms for said to show the emotion with which the direct speech has been said.

And I'm sure you remember that a synonym is a word which has a similar, or the same, meaning to another word.

And we use those to add variety to our writing.

So, let's put some synonyms for said on a spectrum from negative words to positive words.

We could say screamed, yelled, demanded, moaned, asked, wondered, suggested, gushed.

All of those are words which have a similar meaning to said.

But, we can also use actions, things that are not synonyms for said, to show speech.

For instance, we can say smiled and beamed as ways of showing speech without using a synonym for said.

So, I'd like you to choose an appropriate synonym for said, or an action, for each of these speech-first sentences.

All of ours will be different.

But you decide what synonym for said, or action, might work well in each of these gaps.

Pause the video, and have a try.

Well done.

Let's take a look at some possible ideas.

"Who spilt the paint?" Mr. Clarke demanded angrily.

"I'd love to come!" Jacob beamed.

Ash, that's an action, not a synonym for said.

And, "Will you please come with me?" Miss Ofoedu asked.

That was a question, so asked is appropriate in that setting.

Now, we can also use adverbs to show how something was said in that reporting clause.

An adverb describes a verb, it tells us how it's done.

For instance, offered kindly, bellowed loudly, shouted angrily, whispered quietly, asked nervously.

In each case, the adverb is telling us more about how the verb was done, how this was said.

So, adverbs can also show an action.

With a smile, or with tears in his eyes.

And these can be really useful for adding to that reporting clause to give more detail for our reader about the emotions that we are showing.

Now, I'd like you to try and choose an adverb from the list to complete each speech-first sentence appropriately.

So, you have these adverbs, with a smile, angrily, and desperately.

For each gap, decide which one is the most appropriate.

Pause the video, and have a go.

Well done.

Let's check them.

"This is dreadful work!" shouted the headteacher angrily.

"Can someone please help?" Jun asked desperately.

"Thanks for your help today." Miss Ofoedu said with a smile.

Well done if you made those connections.

So, let's look at those reporting clauses in full.

Izzy offered helpfully, bellowed Ms.Ofoedu, asked Jun kindly, Mr. Clarke demanded.

Let's see what's going on in those reporting clauses.

We can see that a reporting clause must include who said it.

We've got our people, our characters who are speaking.

And it must include a synonym for said, which shows how it was said.

Offered, bellowed, asked, demanded.

And it can also also include that adverb to show how it was said.

We've got helpfully and kindly.

I'd like you to try and match the direct speech to the most appropriate reporting clause to show how it was said.

Pause the video, and match the direct speech to the most appropriate reporting clause.

Let's take a look.

"This is a disgrace!", is clearly showing a strong negative emotion, so it should match to Mr. Clarke roared.

"Please, can you help?", is a question, so I would match that to, begged Aisha sadly.

And, "This is good work, Jun.", is obviously a positive statement, so I would match it to, smiled Miss Ofoedu in delight.

Look how we've matched up the emotion in the direct speech to the emotion in the reporting clause.

Now, let's try and put that into practise.

Izzy is speaking.

She says, "I'll hand out the English books." And we want to try and write that as a speech-first sentence.

Here's how we could do it.

First of all, we need to think who is speaking? It's Izzy.

What is she saying? "I'll hand out the English books." How does she say it? Well, maybe she offered helpfully.

That could be part of our reporting clause.

And how should we punctuate it? Well, Izzys not asking a question, and she's not showing a strong emotion.

So, we should use a comma here.

Let's see how it could look.

"I'll hand out the English books," Izzy offered helpfully.

So I can see here I've got who's speaking, Izzy.

What they say? "I'll hand out the English books." How to punctuate it? We said a comma.

And how they say it? She offered helpfully.

And it would look like this if we put it all together in our speech-first sentence.

Now, your turn.

Sam wants to help too.

How could you write a speech-first sentence for Sam's direct speech? Sam is saying, "No, wait, I'll do it." Pause the video, and decide how you could write that as a speech-first sentence.

Let's take a look.

This is how it could look.

You can see I've got the inverted commas, the capital letter, the speech, the closing punctuation.

Now, this is a strong feeling, so I've used an exclamation mark.

Then I've got my closing inverted commas, my reporting clause, and my full stop at the end.

And look at all the ways we've shown a strong emotion here.

We've got our exclamation mark, we've got shouted, and we've got urgently.

So, we're really showing Sam's feelings.

Okay, for your final task this lesson, I'm gonna show you some speech bubbles for three characters.

And for each speech bubble, I want you to write a speech-first sentence using the correct punctuation and an appropriate reporting clause.

Remember, like I've shown in the diagram, your reporting clause should include how they say it and who is speaking.

Here are your speech bubbles.

Lucas is saying "What's wrong?" Andeep is saying, "I hate these shoes." And Sofia's saying, "Let's go and play football." So, I'd like you to pause the video, and try and write your speech-first sentence for each of those speech bubbles.

Good luck.

Okay, let's check our sentences first.

Can you check that you've used the correct punctuation for speech-first? Remember, we should have our inverted commas, our capital letter, our closing punctuation, our closing inverted commas, and our full stop after our reporting clause.

Can you also check your reporting clause? Does it include who was speaking, a synonym for said, and maybe an adverb to show how it was said? So, pause the video, and make those checks now.

Okay, let's look at some examples of what you could have written.

"What's wrong?" ask Lucas kindly.

"I hate these shoes!" Andeep shouted angrily.

And, "Let's go and play football," suggested Sofia with a smile.

Now, your direct speech should look exactly the same as mine.

But your reporting clauses might be different.

You might have used different synonyms for said, and different adverbs to show how the character's feeling.

So, pause the video now, and just check that punctuation has followed our diagram at the bottom.

Well done.

If you've managed to punctuate the sentences correctly, you've done a fantastic job this lesson.

Okay, we learned a lot of rules there, and we tried to apply them to our own writing.

So really, well done for getting all the way through.

Let's just summarise what we've learned this lesson.

We learned that we can use direct speech to show the words a character says out loud.

We learned that the direct speech is signalled to the reader by inverted commas.

We learned that in a speech-first sentence, the direct speech comes first, and is followed by the reporting clause.

And we learned that the direct speech starts with a capital letter, and the reporting clause tells us who is speaking and how they are speaking.

Really, well done if you've managed to master these skills.

And we're going to keep working on them in the next lesson.

I hope to see you then.