Identifying features of a biography in preparation for writing about Darwin
I can identify the features of a biography.
Identifying features of a biography in preparation for writing about Darwin
I can identify the features of a biography.
These resources will be removed by end of Summer Term 2025.
Lesson details
Key learning points
- A biography is a non-fiction text written about someone's life.
- Linguistic features of a biography include third person, formal fronted adverbials, formal tone and relative clauses.
- Structural features of a biography include a title, paragraphs and information grouped by theme.
- A biography is usually written in chronological order and will contain lots of past tense verbs.
- Additional factual information can be added to a clause as parenthesis.
Keywords
Biography - a non-fiction text written about someone’s life
Formal tone - the effect created by choosing serious, factual language
Third person - the 'he/she/it/they' perspective, where we talk about another person
Fronted adverbial - a sentence starter followed by a comma
Relative clause - a type of subordinate clause starting with a relative pronoun (such as who, which or whose)
Common misconception
Pupils may find the formal tone of a biography challenging.
You may wish to provide additional time for children to read a range of biographical writing to 'tune in' to the text type.
To help you plan your year 6 english lesson on: Identifying features of a biography in preparation for writing about Darwin, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs...
To help you plan your year 6 english lesson on: Identifying features of a biography in preparation for writing about Darwin, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs.
The starter quiz will activate and check your pupils' prior knowledge, with versions available both with and without answers in PDF format.
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The assessment exit quiz will test your pupils' understanding of the key learning points.
Our video is a tool for planning, showing how other teachers might teach the lesson, offering helpful tips, modelled explanations and inspiration for your own delivery in the classroom. Plus, you can set it as homework or revision for pupils and keep their learning on track by sharing an online pupil version of this lesson.
Explore more key stage 2 english lessons from the Charles Darwin: biographical writing unit, dive into the full secondary english curriculum, or learn more about lesson planning.
Licence
Starter quiz
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She loves nature.
Exit quiz
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Due to this,
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