Lesson video

Hi there, I'm Mr. Buckingham, and it's so good to see you here for today's lesson.

Today, we're going to be using the storytelling skills we developed in the previous lessons along with the rich vocabulary that we've generated to produce a detailed plan for writing our own narrative.

The better our plan is, the better our writing will be.

So let's see if we can produce some great work together today.

Today's lesson is called "Planning the Build-up of 'Beowulf and the Dragon,'" and it comes from my unit called "Beowulf Narrative Writing" By the end of today's lesson, you'll have planned the structure and content of the build-up of "Beowulf and the Dragon." And for this lesson you will need to have with you the text map and the rich vocabulary that we have produced in previous lessons.

If you're ready, let's begin.

Here are keywords for today's lesson.

The build-up is the part of the story where problems are introduced and tension rises.

And a text map is a visual representation of a series of events where pictures represent events.

Rich vocabulary refers to words chosen intentionally to convey a certain impression to the reader of a place, person, or thing.

And narrative elements are the content of a narrative, often including action, description, dialogue, and emotions.

Here's our lesson outline for today.

We're going to start off by rehearsing our storytelling with our text map using rich vocabulary, and then we'll move on to planning the build-up.

So as you know, we're preparing to write the build-up of "Beowulf and the Dragon." And the build-up is, of course, the part of the story where problems are introduced and the tension rises.

And, of course, in this case, the problem is the presence of the dragon in Geatland and the damage that it's done to the Geat stronghold there.

And then we know that we've prepared a text map that covers the events of the build-up, and it starts when the dragon burns the stronghold.

It ends just before Beowulf starts to fight the dragon, or at least that's the part which is the build-up of our text map.

And of course, we've also generated rich vocabulary to describe the burned stronghold, to describe Eagleness, to describe the dragon, and to describe Beowulf himself.

So we're going to put all of that to use today when we come to plan our build-up.

Now, our rich vocabulary that we generated falls into a range of different categories.

We have words and phrases to describe the stronghold.

For instance, incinerated palisades, the charred remains of the mead-hall, and the blackened thatched huts.

And all of these give the impression that the stronghold has really been badly damaged by the dragon.

We also have words and phrases that describe Eagleness, such as a barren promontory, wind-whipped and bleak, and sheer cliffs battered by waves.

And all of these tries create the impression that Eagleness is a dark, and threatening, and gloomy, and bleak place.

We have phrases to describe the dragon, such as colossal serpent, gaping maw, sinuous tail, and vile worm, all of which are trying to create the impression that the dragon is threatening and dangerous to Beowulf.

And we have words and phrases to describe Beowulf, such as the wrinkled hero, the brave guardian of the Geats, and the ageing hero.

So there we're trying to create the impression that Beowulf is very brave, that he's heroic, but that also he's getting a little bit old as well.

So all of this rich vocabulary will help us to create a clear impression of settings and characters for our reader.

So it's really important we include this in our plan so that when we come to write, it's there readily for us to use.

Now in order to prepare us for that, we can use this rich vocabulary when we're storytelling from our text map.

So here's the build-up from my text map.

You can see I've picked out just the events that are included in the build-up.

So I could take these events, and I could now say this using some of that rich vocabulary.

Remember, when we're storytelling, we're trying to say the events out loud, but we're trying to use a little bit of rich vocabulary, detailed description, in order to make it sound like a story, like this.

"The next morning, Beowulf looked at the damage to the stronghold.

The mead-hall had been incinerated and the palisades were charred and blackened.

All around him, the fields were smouldering." So you can see there I've used the rich vocabulary, and I've tried to say this still using simple sentences, but in a way that uses our rich vocabulary to make it sound like a story.

So which section of the text map has been told using storytelling in the box below? Let me read it to you.

It says, "Beowulf and his warriors put on their iron helmets and they headed to Eagleness.

It was a bleak and barren promontory, battered by icy waves.

The wind-whipped cliffs were sheer." So which section of the text map have I told there using my storytelling skills and by rich vocabulary? Pause the video and decide.

Well done, good job.

Hopefully, you spotted it's this section here, where we've got Beowulf and his soldiers heading off to Eagleness ready to fight.

So notice the rich vocabulary allows me to add some descriptive detail that's not included in my text map.

So I haven't included lots of pictures of Eagleness, have I? So all of this rich vocabulary is layered on top of the text map to add that rich descriptive detail that my readers going to want to hear when they come to read my story.

So using your text map now, can you practise storytelling the events of the build-up of "Beowulf and the Dragon" using also your rich vocabulary? So you should have in front of you both your text map and your rich vocabulary that we generated in the previous lesson.

And I want you to use both of them to say this story out loud.

Remember to refer to your rich vocabulary.

Remember to point at each event as you tell the story.

And remember, you can pause on the events for a while as you add descriptive detail using that rich vocabulary.

So it might be that that picture of Eagleness, you've got your finger on that for a while, as you tell all that detailed description using the vocabulary that you now have.

Pause the video, and have a go at storytelling.

Fantastic job, well done.

So here's how I use storytelling for the first part of my build-up text map.

I said "Under the cover of darkness, a colossal dragon soared through the thatched huts of the Geat stronghold.

It opened gaping maw and breathed fire down on the village, setting the granary ablaze and incinerating the huge mead-hall in seconds." So notice that I've got lots of details that I've said now, which aren't actually in my pictures because they're based on our rich vocabulary.

Hopefully, you've managed to do something similar.

Really well done.

And if you keep practising , you'll get better every single time.

Good job.

So now that we've rehearsed our text map, let's move on to planning our build-up.

So we've now used our storytelling skills to say our build-up aloud, using our rich vocabulary.

Now, if you just wrote down what we've just storytold and said out loud, we'd already have a great story, wouldn't we? But we are going to use careful planning now to try and improve even more and make sure that when we come to write, we've got even more detail in there for our reader to show them just how exciting and dramatic this story is.

So a good plan will include the following things.

We'll have a clear structure, showing how our build-up will be organised, and usually that'll be organised in to paragraphs won't it? With each paragraph referring to particular events.

We'll also want to include notes about the rich vocabulary we might include in our writing.

So all these great phrases we now have, where are we going to put them in our plan so that we include them in those particular places in our writing? And we'll also want to include notes about the content we're going to write, including a range of different narrative elements.

So that will include action, description, emotions, and dialogue.

And we'll talk more about those in a moment.

So let's talk first of all about the structure of our build-up.

We are going to structure the build-up in four sections so that we'll have four clear paragraphs.

Paragraph 1 will describe the dragon attacking the stronghold.

In Paragraph 2, we've got Beowulf's surveys damage and explains that he will lead the attack.

And we'll have the argument with Wiglaf there as well.

In Paragraph 3, Beowulf gonna go to Eagleness and summon the dragon.

So he's gonna make it leave its cave.

And in Paragraph 4 we're going to have the dragon emerging and approaching Beowulf.

So, of course, we covered all these events in our text map.

All we've done here is organise them into four clear paragraphs.

So we split up that text map into a sensible structure so that we can describe each of these key events in the appropriate amount of detail.

So look at your own text map, now.

Can you find the events for each paragraph? Where are the events of Paragraph 1? Where are the events of Paragraph 2? And so on.

And you might want to circle them and number each paragraph that you've circled.

So pause the video, and see if you can spot the events of each paragraph inside your own text map.

And, then I'll show you how I've done it with mine.

Pause the video, and have a look.

Well done.

Great job.

So Paragraph 1 is the dragon attacks the stronghold.

So for me, that's this section.

So I've labelled that 1, and I've circled it.

Paragraph 2 is Beowulf surveys the damage and explains that he will lead the attack.

Now, this is quite a long section for me.

It's all of these events.

So I've got them waking up the next morning, seeing all the damage.

I've got him calling the meeting, saying they need to attack the dragon with Wiglaf saying that's not a good idea, and Beowulf saying he's the only one who can do it.

So all of that is going to go into one paragraph in my story.

Paragraph 3 is Beowulf goes to Eagleness and summons the dragon.

Well, that's this section, isn't it? So I've got there, it's gonna include them going to Eagleness, having their armour on, describing Eagleness, and then describing him summoning the dragon.

And you can see his anger there as he bangs his sword on the rocks to get the dragon to come out.

And then Paragraph 4 is the dragon emerges and approaches, which in my text map is only this one picture here.

Now, why would I only have one picture there? Well, I know that this is where I want to describe the dragon.

So even though there's not much action happening there, there might be an awful lot of description of the dragon so that my reader gets a really clear impression.

So I'm trying not to overload that section with lots of things happening because I know that I'll want to give loads of description of the dragon.

So don't panic if, like me, your different paragraphs look like they're different lengths.

That will be fine.

We're just making sure here that we've got a sensible structure for our four paragraphs.

Really well done for your work there.

So we've talked about the structure of our plan.

Now, let's talk about the content.

And a good way to think about what content to include in our planning is to consider different narrative elements and use those to generate ideas for our content.

So let's talk about the four different narrative elements we might want to include.

First of all, we have action.

Well, what is action? It means what a character's doing and what's happening in this story.

Then we have emotion.

Well that's what are they feeling, and how are they shelling it? So how are they feeling when they see that dragon, for instance? We also have description.

So what can we describe in the story and what do things look like? That might be characters or it might be settings, for instance, in the story.

And we might include some dialogue.

So what are people saying at different points? Can you see how answering these different questions would give us so much detail in each point in our story? So we won't always use every element in every part of our plan, but we want to see a good mix of these elements throughout the story.

So you might have one paragraph which doesn't have dialogue in, and that's fine, but let's try and include some at some points in our story so that we've covered all these different bases.

So let's look at some examples of the different narrative elements being used in writing.

First of all, action.

Well, that's what are people doing and what's happening? So for example, "The monstrous worm let out a puff of smoke, and it slithered across the rocky headland towards Beowulf." So what's it doing? It's letting it a puff of smoke and it's slithering across the rocky headland.

So that is action.

What about description? Well, we could do "On the left, there were the charred ruins of the granary.

On the right, the wheat field smouldered." So we've got descriptions of what the stronghold looks like after it's been destroyed.

What about emotion? Well, that might look like this.

"As he gazed to the sheer cliff, Beowulf clenched his fists in fury and he yelled into the howling wind." So there you can see that Beowulf is very angry.

He's clenching his fist, and he's yelling into the wind.

What about dialogue? We could have, "'I am the monster slayer! I am the only man here who can defeat this beast!' the old warrior bellowed." So we're hearing what Beowulf is saying.

And you might notice that there's often overlap here.

We show emotion through actions.

For instance, here we've got "clenched his fist" as an action, which shows the emotion.

And we include description inside action.

So we've said "Monstrous worm let out a puff of smoke." So we're describing it at the same time as we're talking about doing actions.

So don't panic if you're using more than one of these in a sentence.

That's great.

That's something we should aim for.

We're combining these different elements together in our writing, but it's just worth having a think about each of them so that we can check, have we included each of these elements where it's appropriate to do so? So which narrative element has been used in each of these examples? Pause the video, and have a think.

Well done.

Fantastic job.

So the first one says, "Surveying the blacked palisades, he let out a roar of fury and he felt rage fizzing in his blood." That mostly sounds like emotion, doesn't it? We've got the roar of fury and the rage fizzing.

The second one says "The dragon slithered out of the cave and slid over the barren headland towards Beowulf." We've got slithered and slid there showing movement.

So this is action, isn't it? Then, here we've got an easy one.

It says, "'Come out vial worm!' Roared Beowulf.

' That is definitely dialogue, but you can see there we've got some action there, as well.

"As he hits his great sword on the rocks." And the last one says.

"It's sinuous neck was covered in iridescent scales and it's razor sharp claws with caked in dried blood." That is definitely description, isn't it? We're describing the dragon's appearance to create the impression that it's an unpleasant creature.

So again, we've got that overlap.

Letting out a roar, for example, in that first example, emotion is an action that shows an emotion.

So don't worry if you think they're overlapping.

That's a good thing.

It shows an interesting way of writing.

But we're going to think about these categories to help us generate content for our plan.

Now, within each paragraph we'll plan to include a range of narrative elements.

So what could we include? Well, let's think about Paragraph 1 where dragon attacks the stronghold.

So what actions are happening here? Well, we can show the dragon flying down over the stronghold and causing the destruction.

So it's breathing the fire for instance.

That's an action, isn't it? What about description? Well, we can describe the dragon's appearance as it flies and the appearance of the burning strongholds.

Loads to describe there.

And what about emotion? Well, we can't probably describe the dragon's emotions, but we can describe people in the stronghold screaming as their building from their houses burn.

So we can show their fear as this all happens around them.

Now, in this section, we are less likely to include dialogue as Beowulf will not be involved in it directly.

So we don't have a main character who's going be talking necessarily in this paragraph, at least not the way I've written it in my text map.

Yours of course might be different.

So let's think about Paragraph 2 where bay will survives the damage and explains that he'll lead the attack.

What might we be including for each narrative element for this paragraph? Pause video and have a think.

Well done.

Great first edit.

So for action, we can have things like Beowulf summoning the meeting and deciding to fight the dragon.

For description, we could describe the devastation of the stronghold and the surrounding lands, those burnt fields.

For emotion, we can have Beowulf being really angry about this attack by the dragon and his determination to fight.

But we'll also have maybe some concern and worry from Wiglaf 'cause he's concerned that Beowulf's too old.

And for dialogue, there'll be lots here, won't there? There'll be Beowulf speaking at the meeting, saying they need to fight the dragon, and then Wiglaf speaking to Beowulf and saying, "I'm not sure this is such a good idea." So that's an inspiration for us when we come to plan.

We've thought about the different elements in order to come up with ideas for what content we might include in our plan.

So thinking about the different narrative elements helps us to write our detailed notes for the plan.

As I said, it helps us to generate ideas.

So if we think again about Paragraph 1, where the dragon's attacking the stronghold, our notes for this plan might look like this.

Dragon swooped down.

Vast wings and iridescent scales.

Breathed fire and burned stronghold.

Buildings turn to smouldering ash.

Palisades blazing brightly.

People screaming and running.

Trying to put out fires.

So those of my notes for this section of my plan, and I've done that by using a range of narrative elements.

I've got some description of the dragon here, vast wings, iridescent scales.

I've got action, like breathed fire and burned stronghold.

I've got emotion, like people screaming and running.

I don't have dialogue, remember, in this section, but I've thought about those different narrative elements to come up with these detailed ideas for my plan.

But I also use all of my storytelling knowledge and all my rich vocabulary knowledge to build into this as well.

So where can you see the different narrative elements in Sam's plan for the second paragraph? You can see her bullet point notes for the second paragraph here.

Where has she used the four different narrative elements, Dialogue, description, action, and emotion? Pause video and see what you can spot.

Well done.

Fantastic job.

Maybe he spotted here we've got some action.

He surveyed the devastation.

That's something he did.

Here we've got lots of description of the incinerated granary, the charred remains of the mead-hall, the smouldering fields.

Here we've got some emotion.

He was furious and sad and he clenched his fists.

Here we've got dialogue.

We've got lots of dialogue, actually, haven't we? We've got first of all in the meeting, Beowulf saying, "We must defeat this monster." And then Beowulf saying, "Only I can do it." So we've got plenty of dialogue there too.

So again, thinking about those four elements helped Sam to generate these ideas for her plan.

So it's a combination of those four elements, all of our rich vocabulary knowledge, and all of our storytelling knowledge that has built to make this really great detailed plan.

So let's begin writing our plan, and we're gonna do it in two sections.

First of all, we're going to write the notes for our first two paragraphs.

I want you to try and include the rich vocabulary that we've learned, and try to include a wide range of narrative elements, action, description, dialogue, and emotion.

And of course, use your text map and the prompts I'm gonna show you in a minute to help you with your ideas.

So for Paragraph 1, you might be thinking, well, what happened, and what did people do? Can you describe the dragon and the fires? And can you show people's emotions.

For Paragraph 2, where Beowulf was surveilling the damage, then explaining that he's going to leave the attack, can you describe the damage and show Beowulf's emotions? What did he do, and what did he say? And what did Wiglaf say? So using all of those skills, your storytelling, your rich vocabulary, these prompts, and your ideas about the narrative elements, you're going to have a go at writing bullet point notes for each of those two paragraphs, making sure you organise them really clearly in order to help you when you come to write later on.

Pause the video and have a go at writing your notes for these two sections of the plan.

Fantastic job.

Well done.

Your notes for the paragraphs might look like this.

For Paragraph 1, I've got late at night, colossal dragon swooped down, vast wings and iridescent scales.

Breathe fire at stronghold from gaping maw.

Buildings turn to smouldering ash, palisades ablaze.

Villagers screaming, sprinting, putting out fires.

Then for Paragraph 2, I've said next morning, Beowulf surveyed smouldering ruins.

Charred remains of granary, blackened mead-hall.

There's some description.

Beowulf sad and furious, gritted teeth, clenched fist.

Some emotion.

Called warriors together.

That's an action.

"If we don't act, will return!" That's dialogue.

And then finally, Wiglaf, "Let us join you!" And Beowulf "Only I can!" So those are pieces of dialogue.

Notice how the dialogue, I haven't said the exact words he's going to use.

I've given myself a note that's going to prompt me to remember what it was I wanted be wolf to say there.

So I've used a mixture of narrative elements.

I've used my rich vocabulary.

For instance, I've got gaping maw, iridescent scales, palisades ablaze.

And of course I've used my storytelling skills to help me remember the order of these events.

So I'm really happy now that I've got a great, clear plan that I can use when I come to it.

So let's now do the same thing for our final two paragraphs using our rich vocabulary, our narrative elements, and our text map and storytelling skills to help us come up with ideas for this plan.

So here are some prompts to help you.

Paragraph 3, of course, will be where Beowulf goes to Eagleness and summons the dragon.

So think about how did they get there? Describe Eagleness in detail and what did Beowulf do to summon the dragon? And Paragraph 4, where the dragon emerges and approaches, think about what was the sign that the dragon was coming, and how did it move towards us? And then of course, giving lots of description of the dragon using all the skills we've discussed.

So pause the video and have a go at writing your notes to plan these two sections.

Well done.

Great job.

So here's how your notes for these paragraphs might look.

For Paragraph 3, I've got wrinkled, old king, put an armour, trudge to Eagleness.

There's some action.

Bleak, barren, promontory, battered by icy waves, sheer wind-whipped cliffs.

You can see all my rich vocabulary there in this description piece.

Then, I've got looked for cave, roared in anger, and bashed rocks with sword.

That's emotion, isn't it? And then I've got him saying, "Come out you vile worm!" as some dialogue.

I've used my rich vocabulary mixed in with all those different narrative elements.

For Paragraph 4 with the dragon emerging and approaching, I've got puff of smoke, wind swept headland and blood-soaked serpent snaked out of hole.

Can you see how that one combines description, blood-soaked serpent, with action, snaked out hole? Then, I put back covered in leathery spines, sinuous, barbed tail.

That's pure description, isn't it? Then again, more description, razor-sharp talons and dark glowing eyes.

And I finished with some action, slid down headland towards weather-beaten hero.

So again, weather-beaten hero is a piece of description.

So can you see how all the time here, I'm trying to combine my storytelling skills, my rich vocabulary, my clear structure here in my four paragraphs, and then using those four narrative elements to really generate loads of ideas for my content of my plan.

So I'm really confident now that I've got really detailed notes that will help me to write a brilliant story.

And I'm sure you've done the same.

Great job.

So summarise our learning in this lesson.

We've said that we're preparing to write the build-up of "Beowulf and the Dragon." And a good way of doing this is to practise storytelling using our text map.

And we also prepare to write by planning carefully the structure and content of our writing and any rich vocabulary we wish to use.

When we plan the content of our writing, we can consider different narrative elements, action, description, emotion, and dialogue.

Really well done for your effort in this lesson.

Because you've worked so hard today, it'll make your writing so much easier to do when we come to do that.

I'd love to see you in the next lesson where we'll start writing this part of the story.

I'll see you there.

Goodbye.