Hello, my name is Ms. Grant.

I'm so glad you decided to learn with me today.

We're in the unit "Myths, Legends, and Stories that Inspire." Today we are gonna work on reviewing and refining a piece of narrative writing.

We're gonna look at a number of models, and we're gonna think, "How could we make these even better?" We're gonna think some of the craft you could use in order to improve the writing, but we're also really gonna focus on the idea of proofreading, which is one of my favourite skills, actually, in English.

I love going back to a piece of writing and making sure that it is completely accurate.

It's the nice completion stage of a bit of writing.

I cannot wait to hear all of your fantastic ideas about how to improve some of the writing that we see today and hear all of your ideas about what makes really good proofreading.

I'm gonna be your support and guide as we work through today's lesson together.

Let's get started.

So, by the end of today's lesson, you're gonna have improved a piece of narrative writing by considering sentence structure and vocabulary as well as effectively proofreading.

So we're gonna look at some model responses, some really great writing, but we are going to think, "Well, how could we improve this a little bit more?" And if you can apply this to model writing, then you will be able to apply it to your own writing.

And considering sentence structure, and vocabulary, proofreading, these are things that you can apply not only to creative writing, but also to your analytical writing.

So really important skills in English.

There are some key words which can help us unlock our learning today, and they're gonna be referenced throughout today's lesson.

If you'd like to pause the video and spend some time with these key words, then please do.

I'm just gonna draw your attention to one.

It is the second word and it is "decrepit." That is how you pronounce that word, decrepit, and it means worn out or ruined.

These words are gonna come up throughout today's lesson, but as I say, if you would like to pause the video now and make a note of them, then please do.

Our lesson outline for today.

In the first learning cycle, we are going to think about varied sentence structure and powerful vocabulary.

And in the second learning cycle, when we think, what does it actually mean to proofread, what does that look like? Let's start off with varied sentence structure and powerful vocabulary.

So, Laura wrote a story in response to this prompt.

"Write a narrative inspired by a character or story you have read." And Laura chose to write about a character called the miller from Geoffrey Chaucer's poem, "The Canterbury Tales." If you know it, great, if you don't, don't worry.

Laura's story is going to fill in all the details that you need.

And today you are gonna help her review and refine her story.

So, look at what she has written and then improve it even further.

Now, here's the plot of Laura's story, which follows the five-part narrative structure.

So it starts off with the exposition, which of course establishes your character and setting, introduces some sort of problem or conflict.

And for Laura's character, the miller, this is introducing the miller as wily, cunning and strong and he needs money to fix his bagpipes as he broke them when he was angry.

This is Laura using a detail from the poem, "The Canterbury Tales" by Geoffrey Chaucer, where the character of the miller does indeed play the bagpipe.

So, really nice exposition there.

Then we've got the rising action.

The story builds towards climax, characters, and plot are developed.

So for Laura, this looked like the miller disguised himself as weak and challenging someone in the next village to a wrestling match so that he can win some money.

Again, Laura has used detail from "The Canterbury Tales" itself.

We know that the miller is a very good wrestler.

The climax of the story is a moment of drama and emotional intensity.

It's often short.

One or more character's lives change in some way.

Now for Laura, this is the person who the miller challenges has the same disguise, so when they fight, the miller loses.

So a really nice twist there in her story for that climactic moment.

Then we've got the falling action, the aftermath of the climax.

One or more characters move towards a resolution.

And for Laura's miller, this is the miller watching his opponent celebrating his victory, which I think will be really bitter paragraph, a great paragraph in Laura's narrative.

Then we've got the resolution.

Now the stories end.

Now note that it doesn't need to be happy, simple, or conclusive.

There just needs to be a sense of finality.

So you don't have to have happy ending to your story.

It doesn't need to be simple.

It can be ambiguous.

You could end on a cliffhanger, but there does just need to be some sense of a finality.

Now for Laura's character, the miller, we've got the miller returning home bruised and still with broken bagpipes.

So in some ways, the miller starts where he began, in his mill, sitting there thinking, "Oh no, my bagpipes are broken." So really nice plot there that Laura obviously carefully thought through before she wrote her piece.

Now, after reading her work aloud, which is a really, really good way to spot what's really great about your work, but also to spot any things that you want to change.

So Laura read her work aloud and she realises that the climax of her story is less engaging than the rest of it.

So the middle bit of her story, the climax, the person the miller challenges has the same disguise so when they fight, the miller loses.

And we want that part of the story to be really engaging 'cause it is, after all, the climax, the moment of emotional intensity.

So Laura sets to work to think, "Okay, I'm gonna focus on improving this part of my story." So she decides to focus on rewriting it.

And here is a section of the paragraph Laura wants to improve.

So we're just looking at a short section of this paragraph of the climax.

So here's a first draught.

"The miller fell back.

The miller had been hit with such force that he couldn't stand up.

The miller realised that he was fighting no ordinary opponent." And now I'd like you to discuss why do you think Laura has selected this area for improvement and what improvements would you suggest that she makes? Pause the video and discuss these two questions now.

Welcome back after a really careful discussion.

Well done in looking at Laura's work and thinking what really could improve it.

Now here's some ideas that you might have had.

Well, the sentence structures are really repetitive.

Three of the sentences begin, "The miller," "The miller," "The miller." And that is not a really engaging rhythm that we want to read.

So she needs to rework those sentences, those sentence structures.

And her vocabulary.

Laura's vocabulary doesn't feel particularly well chosen or deliberate.

"Hit" and "felt." Those can be powerful words just because they're monosyllabic or short verbs with one syllable.

It doesn't mean that they're not good, but it just doesn't feel like she's really chosen them with any deliberation or care.

So she needs to go back and really think, "Are these the most appropriate words that I want to use?" So, two really good pointers there for Laura about sentence structures and vocabulary.

So here is Laura's redraft.

Let's read it.

"The miller staggered back.

He thudded to the floor, sack-like.

He strained, but he knew he was spent.

The fight was over.

As sweat streamed down his face, it dawned on him he was fighting no ordinary opponent." We've got the first draught and the second draught there side by side.

Now I would like you to discuss what improvements has Laura made and what effect have they had? Pause the video and discuss these two questions now.

Welcome back.

A really, really careful celebration of Laura's second draught.

So you can see that we've got some really well chosen vocabulary.

We've got "staggered," "thudded," "strained," "streamed." So some really, really nice deliberate vocabulary choices that are clearly chosen to evoke the scene as the miller falls to the floor and is really trying hard to fight this opponent.

We've also got a nice simile there.

"He thudded to the floor, sack-like." So again, it just feels a little bit more like Laura has deliberately chosen her writing to create a really intense, emotionally climactic moment.

Others noticed, actually, I think she's got some sibilance in there.

So repetition of the S sound, "strained," "spent," "sweat," "streamed." So really, really careful reading there.

And actually that does evoke the idea of this kind of sweaty wrestling match that the miller is going through, But unfortunately he can not win because his opponent is stronger than him.

Oh, we've also got it in that word "sack" and "staggered." Good spot there that we've got more sibilance in this paragraph.

So that kind of sound weaves throughout.

So Laura has really gone back and thought, "I can improve this.

I can make that first draught better." And she has indeed achieved it.

Others noticed, while we've no longer got all of these sentence, starting with "The miller," we've got two sentences starting with "He," then one with "The fight." "As sweat streamed down his face, it dawned on him." So we've got a complex sentence there.

So again, just returning to those sentence structures has also really, really lifted Laura's writing.

A great celebration there and a great second draught from Laura.

So just looking at moments of your writing, it doesn't need to be the whole thing.

You can see how you can really, really lift a narrative.

Now here's another sentence from the climax of Laura's story.

"The miller's opponent raised his hands in victory.

He looked tired, bruised, and victorious." And I would like you to rewrite and improve this section to meet this checklist.

I want you to vary the sentence structure, and I want you to really consider the vocabulary choices.

So, pause the video and complete this check now.

Welcome back.

Well done for applying your really fantastic editing skills in order to improve this section of the climax of Laura's story.

Now here is how Laura improved her work.

She wrote, "Haggard and bruised.

." So "haggard," he's really tired or worn expression on your face.

And so one of our key words from today's lesson.

"Haggard and bruised, the miller's nemesis still raised his hands in total triumph.

He, the victor.

The miller, the loser." So we've got really, really nice improvement here.

Yes, we've got some varied centred structure.

We've got that long sentence at the beginning, "Haggard and bruised, the miller's nemesis still raised his hands in total triumph." "He, the victor," so we've got really short sentence.

"The miller, the loser," to contrast that longer sentence.

And we've got well-selected vocabulary.

So we've got this word "haggard," which was one of our key words, meaning worn or really tired, exhausted expression.

And then we've got this word "nemesis." 'cause you can see in the first set of sentences we've got that, "The miller's opponent raised his hands in victory," and, "He looked victorious." So that kind of repetition there doesn't seem for effect.

It just seems that Laura didn't really think, "What could I use instead of 'victorious' or instead of 'victory?'" So now we've got "The miller's nemesis," which means enemy, "Still raised his hands in total triumph.

He, the victor.

The miller, the loser." So, nice improvement there.

And I would like to discuss.

You will not have written the same sentence as Laura.

You will have changed it in many different ways.

How did you rewrite, making sure that you met the checklist? Pause the video and discuss the question now.

Welcome back.

Some beautiful sentences being read out with some very, very interesting vocabulary, some nice, varied sentence structures.

So that moment in Laura's story was just lifted from the more kind of ordinary, less deliberate, less crafted sentences originally to something really beautiful, really powerful, really engaging for the reader.

So, let's look at our first practise task.

I'd like you to rewrite and improve another section of Laura's narrative.

Your improvement should focus on sentence structure and vocabulary, just like we have been doing throughout this learning cycle.

However, you can also alter any other aspect of the work that you wish.

You will have some really creative ideas, and let those creative ideas flow through you, flow through your pen, or you might be writing on your laptop.

So let's have a look at this moment in Laura's story that we want to improve.

It says, "The miller lay on his back on the floor.

The miller's head rested on the dirt.

There were straw, soil, ripped bits of clothing, sweat, spit, and blood.

These were all from the fight.

The miller couldn't believe he had been beaten.

His opponent had looked so old, weak and feeble.

But his opponent had beaten him." So we do have some nice ideas that the bones are there, but we need to improve this, really focusing on sentence structure and vocabulary.

Pause the video, enjoy this rewriting and improvement task, and we will do some feedback and celebrate how you have edited this work shortly.

Pause the video and complete this task now.

Welcome back.

So lovely to see people carefully considering how they are going to improve this work.

We're gonna do a bit of feedback before we celebrate some of the changes that you have made.

So Laura identifies one area she has improved and explains its effects.

So, she looked at, "The miller lay on his back on the floor.

The miller's head, rested on the dirt." She improved that to, "Confused and aching, the miller lay on his back.

His head rested on the ground and his hair was soon riddled with dirt," which means dirt was all over in his hair and it got in between the little bits of his hair.

So, a really nice improvement there.

And Laura says, "I've changed the sentence structure so I don't always start with 'the miller.

' I've also given more thought to my vocabulary, which makes a scene come alive for the reader." Absolutely, I would completely agree with that.

I feel like the dirt is in my hair now because of the way that Laura has written that scene.

So a really, really great improvement there.

Now I'd like you to identify one area you improved and discuss its effects, just like Laura has.

Pause the video and complete this discussion task now.

Welcome back.

It was lovely to hear some beautiful sentences with some really carefully selected vocabulary, some really well chosen and deliberate sentence structures to make the scene come alive, and just improve the ideas that Laura originally wrote in her work.

It was also really nice to hear you discussing the effects.

It shows that you understand that writing, each choice you make, each word you choose, each punctuation mark you choose, it has an effect on the reader.

And thinking about that can really help you improve your creative writing as you think, "I know that this is meant to move the reader in some way, and what effect is it having?" Okay, we're gonna move on to our second learning cycle, one of my favourite skills in English.

So we have looked at very central structure and powerful vocabulary, and we've looked at changing a section of Laura's story.

But actually now we're going to consider this idea of proofreading.

And proofreading is something you do to an entire story.

In some ways you make less radical, less big changes than you do when you are focusing on a short section and thinking about changing sentence structure and vocabulary.

But it can still have an enormous effect on your writing.

So let's have a consideration of what proofreading is, what it looks like.

So, the final thing Laura wants to do is proofread her whole narrative.

And people's discuss what good proofreading looks like.

And I'd like you to discuss what of things might they be saying.

So you might have heard this word "proofread" before.

What does it mean to you? What do you think some of these students might be saying proofreading looks like? Pause the video and discuss the question now.

Welcome back.

Really good to hear that you've got a good understanding of what this idea of proofreading means.

Let's have a look at some of the other pupil ideas and see if they resonate with you.

So Sam says that you can focus on one area at a time.

For example, punctuation.

That's what proofread means, focusing on one area, maybe a punctuation, and really thinking, "Is it accurate throughout?" Sophia says, "You could read your word backwards to catch extra spelling errors." Now this was a new idea for me, but I found it really, really effective.

So it doesn't mean reading the words actually backwards, but it just means the sentences, rather than reading them forwards and thinking about the sense, you go through each word and therefore you are focusing on each individual word and can really think, "Is this spelled correctly?" Alex says, "Read your work aloud so you can check it makes sense grammatically." Now this is something that I have done for so many years.

And when I was taught that this was a really good technique for proofreading, it really changed the quality of my writing, because reading your work aloud, you can hear the errors, and then you can start to think, "Okay, I can change them." If you just read it really quickly in your head, it's often really easy to miss them.

But reading your work aloud, it forces you to consider, "Have I got that full stop in the right place? Have I got that comment in the right place? Does this sentence actually make sense?" And finally, Andeep's idea.

"Correct small errors rather than rewriting everything out in full." So it is just about correcting those small errors and maybe putting a line through a particular word or adding a full stop.

It's not about rewriting huge, huge sections of your writing.

So proofreading means a lot of different things and there are little skills, little things that you can do in order to really, really lift your work and make it even better by improving its accuracy and sense.

So Laura follows Alex's advice first, which is read your work aloud so you can check it makes sense grammatically.

Now this section of her story is part of the rising action when the miller decides to disguise himself.

So let's read it, like Laura, aloud and see if we can catch any errors.

"He flung open the door of his mill and strode out into the open air where he could think.

he breathed deeply wandered over to clear river and gazed at his reflection.

He realised he beginning to look older his bright red beard had signs of grey and his eyes appeared tired.

He was not far of looking as broken as his bagpipes." So I found it really, really useful there to read that work aloud.

I could hear some of the things that I wanted to change.

So I'd like you to read at Laura's work aloud yourself, and then discuss what errors should she correct.

Pause the video and complete these two tasks now.

Welcome back.

I hope you found reading it aloud as useful as I do.

And here are some of the errors that you might have seen.

So, this sentence doesn't make sense yet.

"He breathes deeply wondered over to clear river and gazed at his reflection." Doesn't make sense yet.

That something she needs to do.

Alter it, maybe add a word to help that sentence makes sense.

This sentence has a missing word and a missing full stop.

"He realised he beginning to look older his bright red beard had signs of grey and his eyes appeared tired." So missing full stop and a missing word.

That's something I often do.

Often miss out words, especially if I'm writing quite quickly.

So that's why proofreading is a really important skill for me.

This sentence uses of instead of off.

So, really easy mistake to make.

We've got lots of words in English, which are spelled almost the same, but slight differences, needing to be aware of them.

So, "He was not far of looking as broken as his bagpipes," is not quite right yet.

So Laura corrects her work and vastly improves her writing.

Let's have a read through now.

"He flung open the door of his mill and strode out into the open air where he could think.

He breathed deeply, wandered over to the clear river and gazed at his reflection.

He realised he was beginning to look older.

His bright red beard had signs of grey and his eyes appeared tied.

He was not far off looking as broken as his bagpipes." So some small but really crucial changes there, which mean that reading it is now a pleasure.

Reading it aloud is now a pleasure, rather than be thinking, "Ah, there's something not quite right here." So vastly, vastly improves your work, even though it's just small changes that you are making.

Now, a check for understanding, quite a difficult check before we move on to our final practise task where we really test your proofreading skills.

So I would like you to proofread each sentence, A, B, C, and D.

Which ones need to be corrected for errors? So, take some time with this.

You might want to practise some of those proofreading skills like reading the work aloud or reading it backwards and see if you can identify which sentences need to be corrected.

Pause the video and complete this check now.

Welcome back.

Well done for completing this tricky check, and well done.

If you identify that it was A, C, and D that all needed to be corrected.

Let's have a look at them.

"The miller punched his hand into the water and destroyed his reflection became a smash of foam and ripples." So there is a word there, "destroyed," doesn't quite make sense.

The sentence doesn't make sense yet.

All the words are spelled correctly, but the grammar is not quite there.

If we look at C, "The miller punched his hand into the water and his reflection became a smash of foam and ripples." We've got some punctuation errors here.

So punch does not need a capital letter, and we need a full stop at the end of "ripples." And D, "The miller punched his hand into the water and his reflection becomes a smash of foam and ripples." Well done if you spotted the mistake here, it's quite hard.

But "punched" is in the past tense.

But "becomes," which is the next verb, is in the present tense.

So we need to change it so that it's all in the same tense.

So it would be, "The miller punched his hand into the water and as a reflection became a smash of foam and ripples." Very easy to sometimes change tense in the middle of a story and it's a good thing to proofread and check.

Can I look at my verbs? Are they all in the same tense? Have I started in the past tense, I need to maintain and be in the past tense? Or have I started in the present tense and I need to maintain and be in the present tense? Well done for completing that check and showing off your excellent proofreading skills.

So our final practise task, I'd like you to proofread this next section of Laura's narrative and follow each piece of the people's advice to guide you.

So, read the work aloud to check its grammar.

You might want to read it backwards to check the spelling errors, focus on one area at a time.

For example, punctuation.

Correct errors rather than rewriting everything in full.

Now you can see we've got a really nice paragraph here with some vocabulary selected.

We've got, "As he lamented his haggard face." So "lamented" meaning an expression of grief, and "haggard" meaning really exhausted.

And then the miller later says, "His body looked decrepit." So, really old and worn out.

Now I'm not gonna read the paragraph out for you 'cause that's gonna be part of your proofreading practise.

Enjoy this task.

It's something I always enjoy doing, proofreading, because it makes such a big difference, but you're just making small corrections.

Pause the video and complete this practise task now.

Welcome back.

Fantastic, really careful proofreading there of this bit of work.

And you've identified so many ways in which Laura can just lift her work a little bit.

Harder than it looks.

So lots of people reading it aloud, reading it backwards.

It does take some time, it does take some practise, but it is well worth it.

So here are the errors Laura noticed.

I'm just gonna draw attention to them.

And then we're gonna have a discussion about how we might correct them.

So we've got, at the beginning, between this word "face" and "he" there's something wrong there.

Something wrong between the word "answer" and "he." Something wrong with that word "disguise." Something wrong in between "competition" and "the," We've got an error with that word "everyone" and between the words "that" and "whilst." We've got an error between the words "as" and "we." We've got an error with that word "there" at the end.

And finally with that word "impress." So these are some of the errors that you might have picked up.

Now, using this word wrong, an error.

You might think, "Oh my goodness, this bit of writing is a bit of a mess." But absolutely not.

There's loads of wonderful things about this bit of writing and Laura has been really, really focused on writing beautifully, on thinking about her vocabulary.

Going back and proofreading is a part of the writerly process.

It doesn't mean that you've failed as a writer, it means you're doing the right thing 'cause you're going back and checking your work.

Every good writer does it.

Every brilliant writer does it.

That is why they are so brilliant.

So it's about going back and just amending those errors rather than being annoyed with yourself for making them.

Everybody makes errors when they are writing.

The important thing is to go back and amend them.

So I would like you to discuss now, how did you correct each error? So a couple of things that you might have needed to do to correct each of these errors.

So, discuss this question now.

Welcome back, showing off your fantastic spelling, punctuation, and grammar knowledge by correcting lots of these errors.

I'm gonna draw attention to just three.

So the word "disguise" was one that nearly escaped me, so thank you for drawing attention to it.

But that word "disguise," it needs an "I" in it so it's not yet spelled correctly.

Let's have a look at this homophone near the end.

So we've got this word "there." It is spelled correctly, but it is a wrong there.

It should be T-H-E-I-R because he's pulling the doors off their hinges, the hinges that belong to them.

And then we've also got a missing full stop.

He wants to enter the wrestling competition, and it then needs to be a full stop.

And then.

Sorry, not a full stop.

There needs to be, you can see how proofreading is quite difficult because going through all of these sentences can be quite hard.

We need "in the next village." "He's gonna enter the wrestling competition in the next village." So, proofreading is a taxing task.

It does require some time and energy, but it is well worth it because correcting those errors would make this bit of writing a really, really beautiful in Laura's work, rather than us thinking, "Ah, it's not quite there yet because there are just a few errors here." So in summary, reviewing and refining piece of writing is an important skill in English.

There might be areas of your work that you want to rewrite, focusing on particular areas of weakness.

Proofreading is the final stage of the writing process.

Proofreading means to read through a piece of written work and correct any errors.

Strategies like reading aloud, reading backwards, or reading with a particular focus can help you proofread successfully.

It has been such a pleasure to look at at Laura's writing today and to help her improve it, and I look forward to seeing you next time.