Lesson video

Hi, welcome back to grammar, with me, Ms. Richards.

Can you believe that we are at our penultimate, that means second to last, our penultimate lesson.

Can't believe how quick it's gone.

Let's not waste any time because today our heroes are going on a climactic battle, and I know we're really excited for that.

Before we can go, though, make sure that you've got yourself set up so that you've got pen, paper, you've got the rest of the story that you were writing in case you need to look back, and you're somewhere nice and quiet without any distractions.

You've turned notifications off on all your devices.

If you haven't got any of those things, just pause the video now to get yourself organised and then press play when you're ready.

Hopefully, you've got yourself all set up.

If not, just pause the video now, and use this as your reminder slide.

Okay.

Today, we're going to talk about short sentences.

So these should be things you're really confident with, from previous grammar work or work your teacher.

And we're going to look at how they create movement, and then how we build to the climactic moment.

Then you get to where you get to add this moment into your story, what was so desperate to do, and we'll finish with a quiz.

Let's get going straight away.

Okay.

Short sentences should be really, really familiar.

We're going to look it maybe a little bit more detailed than you might know, just to make sure we really understand what they are.

This, we know it's kind of my favourite sentence structure.

We can add lots of detail to independent clause.

We can really support our reader.

We can build characterization, all sorts.

And here's an example of it.

With tears in his eyes, the young prince gasped at the beautiful castle, which stood in front of him.

So we know that we're really familiar with it.

You're probably fed up with the sentence structure, and you'll be pleased to know that we're not really thinking about sentences this long because we're looking at short sentences.

So we're just going to focus on the independent clause.

And you should know from previous grammar work, but it might be new to you, that an independent clause is made up of a subject, verb, and object.

There are three parts to our independent clause.

If we use the previous example from the previous slide and we take the independent clause, the young prince gasped at the beautiful castle, we can break this independent clause down into three parts: the subject, the young prince, that's the thing that's being named, the verb, gasped, so the action that the subject is doing, and then the object, and that's what the young prince is gasping at.

Really straightforward.

You might not know the terms subject, verb, object.

You don't need to, but they are useful in reminding us that our independent clause has three parts: the subject, the verb, and the object, or the extra information to help sentence makes sense.

They we go, so beautifully colour coded in each part for you.

Well, if I were to make a short sentence, actually, I don't even want that level of detail.

What I can do is just strip the sentence down.

It's still got to make sense.

It still has to be completely understood, but I'm going to remove any excess information.

And I've stripped this to the prince gasped.

That's it.

Three words.

Makes it very short, very sharp.

The prince gasped.

Got rid of all the other detail around it that dilutes it.

But I don't want to lose that detail.

So where I had my original subordinate clause, independent clause, subordinate clause, I still included those details, but I've now put them after.

So I start with my short sentence, the prince gasped.

And then I give our reader much more information about what they're gasping at.

The castle was so beautiful that it took his breath away.

He blinked away the tears that gathered in his eyes.

That's just allowing us much more information, but still keeping that short, sharp, short sentence.

So back to our nice, long complex structure.

Here's a new example.

Before he could even think about raising his shield in protection, the dragon's flames engulfed Rokas and scorched his armour.

Here we go.

So we've got our subordinate clause, it's well punctuated, we've got our independent clause, and then a second subordinate clause.

But for a short sentences, we're just thinking about these independent clauses.

And this one is the dragon's flames engulfed Rokas.

Our subject then is the dragon's flames; our verb is engulfed; and our object is Rokas.

So we want to see if we can strip this down and remove any excess words, any words that aren't needed so we can make this as short and sharp as possible.

I can get rid of dragons.

So now it's just the flames engulfed Rokas.

Or I can get rid of the.

And I'm going to change this to flames engulfed Rokas.

I've stripped it right away and removed that determinant.

But I still want my details.

So I go back to the original complex sentence and I still take that information: flames engulfed Rokas.

Before he had even had a chance to raise his shield in protection, his armour was scorched by the dragon.

Or I can swap it around.

My short sentences don't always have to be at the start.

Before he'd even had a chance to raise his shield in protection, his armour was scorched by the dragon.

Flames engulfed Rokas.

And I can finish with my short and snappy sentence instead.

It just adds variety into our writing and creates a texture where you've got long and fluid complex sentences with a very short, sharp, snappy short sentence.

Here's a task for you then.

I've given you two complex sentences.

What I want you to do is to pick out a short sentence from them and then change the rest of the information into an adjoining complex sentence.

So just like you saw me do here, it doesn't matter if the short sentence comes at the start or at the end.

You're going to make a short sentence.

And then you're going to include the rest of the information by rewriting it slightly.

It doesn't have to be a three-word short sentence; it might be four or five words.

But from the here then, pause the video, pick out your short sentence, and then rewrite the rest of the information around it.

Let's have a look at that.

It's quite a difficult thing to do.

So number one, I've picked out, Jamila walked quietly.

That's going to be my short sentence.

So I've put that short sentence to the start.

And then, she didn't want to disturb the sleeping cat, so she tiptoed carefully along the wooden floor.

You'll notice I've had to change tiptoeing to tiptoed.

That is something we have to be really careful of when we rewrite like this.

If you weren't sure, and that's now helped you, have a go at the second one.

And if you've done the second one, let's see how you did.

Now, this one, there's a couple of possibles.

You could have done the short sentence, he was late, or you could have done the short sentence, Matt stopped for coffee.

I'm going to look at this one, he was late.

He was late.

However, Matt stopped for a coffee and a pastry because it was going to be a long day.

There aren't always the same short sentences.

We just have to think about what's the most catching of these, what's going to have the most impact being short and sharp.

You'll notice I've had to make a change here as well.

Originally, it said although.

But that wouldn't have fitted here.

He was late, although Matt stopped for a coffee and a pastry.

It doesn't work.

So I've had to change that to however.

That's fine.

That's just editing.

Okay.

You know I like to talk about mistakes that students make.

And we've talked about short sentences.

We've talked about picking out information that's really impactful.

So have a look at this example, then.

Flames engulfed Rokas.

He jumped.

The dragon leaped.

Rokas drew his sword.

The dragon ducked.

Rokas swung.

He hit the dragon.

It roared.

It was angry.

Rokas hit it again.

The dragon fell.

Rokas jumped.

The dragon was dead.

That has lots of short sentences.

It's obviously a very dramatic battle between Rokas and the dragon, but there are a lot of short sentences, aren't there? So one of the mistakes that students make is they overuse short sentences and they become very repetitive.

We want to add that texture.

So we want to mix short sentences in with our more complex sentences.

For a short sentence to have impact, we need to mix them with complex sentences.

Too many short sentences becomes bland.

Just like you saw there, it becomes bland, it's not interesting.

It just becomes very repetitive.

The other thing we can do when we're thinking about short sentences is we can put just single words in our narration.

Let's look at what I mean there.

She listened carefully.

In the distance, she could hear some gentle rumblings and the odd squeak.

What? Squeak? She paused for another moment and held her breath.

Yes.

There were definite squeaks amongst the stuffed vibrations of the dragon's rumbling breath.

Did that mean squeaks? Were there baby dragons in the cave too? You'll see here that I've got some single words that are correctly punctuated.

So we've got what, squeaks, yes, and squeaks, again, repeated.

And these show the thought pattern of the hero from this bit of the story.

It shows the thing that is in their mind.

And they're not thinking in long complex sentences here, because they're confused.

What? Squeaks? Their brain isn't working in long complex sentences because we don't think and we don't speak in long complex sentences.

Sometimes very short utterances are what we'll use.

And so we can mimic that in a narration with just single words.

Here's another example for you then.

He ran and propelled himself across the Canyon.

He hit the edge with a thud.

His legs dangled over what would be a deadly fall.

Luckily, he managed to scramble up and pull himself onto the side.

He needed help quickly.

His wound was bleeding fast.

Droplets of red pooled at the ground.

Someone! Anyone? Please! Help.

You will have spotted the single words there as well: quickly, someone, anyone, please, help.

Particularly this final pleading moment, we've used short sentences there to repeat.

And this is because our hero here is desperate.

They don't have time for a long, complicated sentence with lots of beautiful adjectives and a metaphor in there.

Actually, the short sentences here represent their desperation and their urgency.

So we can really craft our short sentences.

Now we can also create movement using these ideas.

We can control the pace of our text by thinking about our word choice, the sounds that they make, and the type of sentence that we put them in.

And if we're thinking about creating battles, then we might want it to feel very quick.

And if we're thinking about building the tension, then we might want to think about slowing the pace of our text down.

Here's a quick task for you then, something I think you can do really easily.

I'd like you to pause the video and select the adverbs that make your writing quiet.

If you wanted to write something where it was very quiet and there was no noise, which of these adverbs would you use? Nice and easy.

I'm sure you got these.

You could use carefully, gently, quietly, slowly, softly.

And all of these adverbs would create a piece of writing that would feel quieter, softer, and they would represent the lack of noise around the hero.

So what if you wanted to make your writing sound really violent? Which adverbs would you select if you were trying to do a really violent piece of writing? Pause the video now to write them down.

I'm sure you got it straight away.

You could use quickly, suddenly, urgently, hastily, violently.

And I've also put carefully back in here as well, because you could still be very careful while you're being violent.

But also we want a sense of pace, sudden, urgent, haste, quick, so we get speed with the violence.

Let's have a think then about appropriate choices.

He, blank, across the floor whilst trying not to wake anyone.

Which of the four words stomped, tiptoed, walked, or marched would you put in that sentence? Pause the video now to write it down.

Hopefully, you said tiptoed.

If he's trying not to wake anyone, then we want a verb that shows that, that represents it.

Let's have another one.

Ready to defend, the pirate, blank, his sword.

Pointed, moved, swung, or held.

Now, all of these will work, but which one do you think is most appropriate? Pause the video to make your choice.

I've gone with swung because the pirate's ready to defend.

Swung shows that he's moved his sword into place.

But rather than just moved it, swung gives us some energy, maybe suggest he's made a great big arc and a big show of having his sword ready.

You could have said pointed, mood, or held they all work, but swung gives us a bit more movement and a bit more energy behind it, which makes it a really appropriate choice.

Here's two for you this time.

Blank, his free arm, the explorer, blank, the rock.

So you're going to have to put in two appropriate words here.

And your choices are: swinging, touching, held, punched, stretching, waving, grabbed, swam.

Pause the video now to complete the sentence.

I'm sure you got this.

Swinging his free arm, the explorer grabbed the rock.

You could have put stretching his free arm as well.

Stretching would make it quite slow.

He's reaching and reaching and stretching and being really, really careful before he grabs the rock; swinging suggest he's done it in one quick movement.

So you'd have to decide if you were going for a quick speed, in which case it's appropriate to you swinging, or something a bit slower and really drawing out the tension, In which case, stretching suggests there might be uncertainty whether he can reach.

And this is what we have to think about with our word choices.

We are reaching that moment that we have been waiting for that it feels like every lesson has been building towards this climactic moment, this epic part of our fantasy for our hero.

Come on in then, let's not delay.

We know that in our fantasies, this is the big moment when our hero meets the problem, or they battle when they struggle and there's a fight.

It's the exciting bit, isn't it? We know from our story order then that we're all following the same story order.

We've got different heroes, we've got different problems. We're going to have different battles, but we're all doing the same part.

And this is our penultimate, our second-to-last, moment.

This is what our story has really been building to.

So let's check we understand first.

Climax or climactic is the top point.

It's the bit that it's all building to.

It's the very peak of all the action.

And it doesn't matter if we're in an action genre, Gothic genre, the romance genre, or fantasy, the climactic moment or the climax is that very high point.

So in action, it might be the battle between good and bad.

In Gothic, it might be the moment when our hero comes across the supernatural creature.

Romance doesn't have to be full of violence.

The climactic moment in a romance can be the point when the two lovers are secretly meeting.

And then in fantasy, it tends to be our hero.

So we know we've got a problem then.

And these were our choices from two lessons ago.

If you need to pause the video to remind yourself what your problem was, or to read back your story, now's the time, because we must make sure all of our choices fit.

I obviously come back to the story that I've been writing alongside you.

And my choice is that a dragon has been spotted in the woods.

That's the climactic moment that mine is building to, when my hero Clover has decided that she's going to be seen as dragon in the woods.

Now, although I'm using this as our image prompt today, because in my story, the dragon is in the woods, if you've done a unicorn or a cursed object, or somebody being rescued in your story, then this image prompt isn't going to work.

But you know it's a reminder that we're meeting that big problem for the first time.

What I want you to think about, does there need to be a bloody and violent battle? I know we've been building up to it, and if you want one, feel free, put in a bloody and violent battle, put in lots of tension and weapons and drama.

But sometimes there can be conversations and talk.

There can be a moment when the hero just manages to run in, grab the object, and escape at high speed with the vicious creature trapped inside the building, because they've set off a trap or something like that.

So there doesn't need to be a battle between good and evil.

There can be another solution if you want.

You're going to have to think about what does the creature or object look like.

You might choose to spend some time describing it, or you might assume your reader knows what it looks like and you don't need to.

Think about the pace of your climactic moment.

Is it a really high energy battle where there's so much movement and it's constantly like your reader is jumping from one bit to the next almost like the reader doesn't know where to look and they don't know what's coming next? Or is your pace slower and more drawn out with just one moment where it's maybe a little bit more urgent? Have you got a softer climactic moment? And think about how your character feels in that moment.

Is your hero feeling brave? Are they nervous? Are they scared? I'd like you to pause the video now and write down your answers to these questions to form your plan.

Press play when you're ready.

But don't write your whole story yet, we'll do it in a minute.

So in my story, because I'm always sharing with you my planning, actually, I'm not going to have a bloody and violent battle.

You're going to have to wait and see what I do, but mine is going to be solved through a lot of tension but talk.

I'm also not going to describe too much what the dragon looks like.

I'm going to describe the dragon's flames and the way the smoke curls, but I'm not going to say what colour my dragon is.

I'm going to let my reader imagine that themselves.

My pace is going to change.

There's going to be some really nerve-wracking tense moments, some slightly quicker moments, but a lot of it is going to be softer than I think you might expect for a climactic moment.

And I think we can imagine that 12-year-old Clover is going to be feeling very nervous.

Okay.

I've got a plan.

I know you've spent some time making a plan as well.

So let's look at our instructions so that we can write.

You are going to write one paragraph minimum.

There's going to be some description.

You are going to describe seeing the object or creature.

You don't have to describe every colour, every detail, but at least the fact that your character is in them.

You're going to think about how you create energy and pace by making sure your word choices are appropriate.

I'm going to add speech.

If you want to do the same, you'll need to think back to all of our speech rules.

And you're going to decide if you're using short sentences.

I definitely will be.

And you might've had a little clue at my story earlier.

If you know what you want to do, pause the video now and get going.

If you're not sure, you know, there's always a little bit of help.

So you can some of your sentences with suddenly, quickly, or slowly.

So suddenly, Clover lurched for help.

Suddenly, the dragon appeared.

Quickly, Clover pulled out her sword.

Or slowly, Clover appeared out from behind the rock.

Whatever your hero is, whatever you've chosen, these are some really good sentence starters.

And here's another sentence starter that you might want to use.

Near the back of the, blank, blank, could see.

So near the back of the cave, Clover could see.

Or near the back of the castle, Rokas could see.

You can change that to fit your hero, to fit your object, whatever it is.

Maybe you want something slow.

So careful not to disturb the.

Careful not to just stop piles of gold, hero's name did this.

Careful not to disturb the dragon, Clover did this.

Again, these are just options, you do not have to use them.

But have a look, see, do they make your writing a little bit more exciting? If you've finished your writing and you've come back to the video, well done.

Again, just have a look.

Can you steal one of these sentence starters and go back and edit.

And then you could just do a really nice, straightforward sentence with your hero's name.

So Clover could not.

Clover could not believe that she could see this.

Clover could not think what to do.

You can use that in so many versatile ways, but they just help.

So if you haven't written it, pause the video now, use some of these sentence starters and get going.

If you have, very well done, but we know that really good writers check their work and they edit their work.

So let's reach that point.

Here's our checks.

You're going to need to read through your writing and check for these things.

Have you done at least one paragraph that is indented? I know I got carried away and mine is far longer than one paragraph.

There's about five paragraphs in mine.

So you might have done two and that's fine.

But do you make sure you've written at least one.

Have you included some kind of description? Have you described the moment when the object or the creature is first seen? Have you built some energy and pace? Have you thought about all of your word choices and deliberately selected them? If you've included speech, is it all punctuated properly? And did you use any short sentences or any single words sentences? I hope you really enjoyed writing that moment.

I know I loved writing my moment.

I got completely carried away with the moment that we've been building too in my story with Clover and the dragon.

I wonder if you've guessed what's going to happen.

I had to give you a little clue earlier on in this lesson.

And if you have been doing the same thing as me, I wonder if your story has gone the same way as mine, or if you've done something different.

I'm going to share my writing now.

As always, I'm going to disappear from this top corner so I don't distract you and you can just listen and enjoy and I'll pop back right at the end to see you.

Clover froze in fear.

Those were flames.

But that was definitely a dragon in the cave really close to her.

She listened carefully.

In the distance, she could hear some gentle rumblings and the odd squeak.

What? Squeaks? She paused for a moment and held her breath.

Yes, there were definite squeaks amongst the soft vibrations of the dragon's rumbling breath.

Does that mean squeaks? Were the baby dragons in the cave too? Clover twisted her hand around the hilt of her sword.

She took her shield out from where it had been stowed on her back.

Holding them brought her a sense of calm and made her feel like a real knight, sort of, anyway.

How calm could you be when you were preparing yourself to face a fire-breathing dragon? She wasn't exactly known for being the bravest.

In fact, let's be fair.

Compared to her brother, she felt weak and cowardly all the time.

Her brothers were great, valiant and noble like they were born to be Knights.

They're bravery shone brighter than the stars in the sky.

For Clover, she was just a knight through heritage alone.

Maybe she should turn around and walk back.

The group would surely be arriving soon.

They'd never know she was here and they could face the dragon.

No, she was a brave knight.

Clover straightened up and took a cautious step forward before stumbling over a loose rock.

She squealed aloud before shoving her hand to her mouth to stifle the sound.

She did not need to alert the dragon to her presence now.

Scrambling across the loose rocks, Clover took stock of the deep, dark cave in front of her.

Who is there? A deep growling voice purred from the dark cave.

Wisps of smoke curled and danced in the air forming shapes and letters that wrapped around Clover, twirling and weaving in a net of smudge.

There was no disguising when a dragon spoke to you.

Clover gulped.

She'd been hoping for an element of surprise that the dragon might be sleeping when she'd approached, or maybe just away.

Do dragons go on vacation? That would have been convenient.

Walked straight into the cage to find the dragon had packed his, her favourite suit and tie, suitcase and gone for vacation.

Where would the dragon go? It would quite obvious.

Well, at least they could fly, so wherever they liked, probably.

Right.

This was definitely not the point.

I'm probably not relevant to the current situation.

Small wisps of smoke curled closer to Clover.

With a final breath and the confidence to fight her, Clover smiled brightly.

"Hello," she called out.

"I'm Clover from Elmdale.

"I've come to come to, come to.

." "Kill me?" The dragon purred.

There was the sound of a smile to the dragon's voice.

Did dragons smile? Was that possible? Right.

Not the focus again.

Nope, definitely not.

Nope.

Clover squeaked pleased that the dragon can see the way she grasped her sword tighter, her mother's sword.

"Did I? Did I hear? "Do you have babies?" Clover asked nervously.

"I do," the dragon purred in response.

"Do you plan to kill them, too?" Clover froze in shock and shook her head.

"Yet, there's a group of knights, just like you, "who will be here shortly "if my patrols are not mistaken.

"I suspect that they will be planning to kill myself "and my babies.

"Am I correct?" The dragon tilted its head slowly as it questioned Clover.

Clover exhaled and released in one quick breath.

"Only because they don't know you have babies "and you're a mother, "and so I guess you probably just want to raise your family "safely and you haven't moved here "because you want to kill us in the village, "but they're scared you might.

"It's just, they're judging you on the other dragons "who did lots of damage and now everyone's scared "of dragons." Clover took a deep and shuddering breath.

The dragon purred softly as it spoke.

The rumbles and wisps of smoke blew patterns around Clover's armour.

"Then young knight, I suspect, you know what you must do." Clover's heart beamed at being addressed as a knight.

The dragon thought she was a real knight.

Clover began to strap her shield onto her back and turned so her back was to the cave.

She listened intently as a near-silent footsteps of the approaching group neared.

With soft and padded steps, the dragon slunk slowly back into the cave.

Clover could still smell the smoke so she knew the dragon was close but hidden.

As the group of knights turned the corner and face the cave, Clover let out a roar louder than any dragon.

"Stop!" She bellowed.

The approaching knights froze.

Their swords were already drawn and bows nuked with arrows.

Clover held her sword out in response as if she alone could take on a group of fully trained and armed knights.

"Who goes there?" Her father's calm and steady voice questioned, a wise alert on the cave behind Clover.

"Don't hurt this dragon.

She has babies, please.

"She's not going to hurt you." Clover began, trying to disguise her voice so her father wouldn't recognise her.

"Stand down young knight or get taken down," her father warned.

Clover began to protest, but her father raised his own sword, an unspoken warning.

Clover knew there was any one thing she could do.

She had to break the number one rule that was drilled into all knights.

Slowly, Clover sheathed her sword and lifted her helmet's visor.

Never expose your face on the battlefield.

It left you vulnerable.

Her brother and father gasped followed by others in the group who recognised her.

Their swords began to waiver.

Should they be pointing them at the chief's daughter? "Clover! What on earth? "Get behind me quick." Her father launched forward as if to protect her.

Clover jumped back and shook her head.

"No, put your weapons down." Her father nodded a slow instruction to the group to lower their weapons.

"You've come to fight a dragon," Clover began.

She paused and collected her thoughts.

This speech needed to be perfect.

"You've decided because previous dragons were dangerous "that this one must be too.

"But you forgot the first rule in the chivalric code, "defend, not attack.

"We are knights.

We defend others.

"You say you're defending Elmdale, "but this dragon hasn't attacked us.

"She's just living nearby and raising her family.

"She's not here to harm us, but she will protect her family "like you're protecting yours." Clover paused.

Had she said enough? "Each of you have come here ready to break the first rule "in the chivalric code.

"Yet you stand here and call yourself knights." Slowly, as if on cue, the dragon appeared from the depth of the cave with its head and neck lowered in submission.

The knights shook as they hastily pulled out their weapons.

"Stand down your weapons," Clover instructed, a tone of voice beguiling her younger years.

"She means no harm." Courageous Clover.

The dragon defender of Elmdale, is correct.

The dragon purred as delicate wisps of smoke prowled and danced with each breath.

"I come to negotiate." I told you I got a bit carried away, didn't I? Oh, my goodness.

Okay.

I did write a lot and I'm not expecting that you've written that much.

But I hope you enjoyed it.

Did you expect that Clover would talk to the dragon and realise that the dragon was a mom and just wanting somewhere to live? Or did you think Clover was going to come in and try and fight it and put herself in danger? Sometimes we don't need a battle.

Sometimes just talking can be as powerful and as nerve-wracking as fighting.

Now, we need our heroes' ending, but that's next time.

So for now, don't forget, please, that you need to do your quiz, and I will see you for our last lesson.