WRITING

BOOKLET
6TH JUNIORS

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WRITING AN ARTICLE
 Informal letter.

USEFUL LANGUAGE

FUNCTION EXPRESSIONS
Giving news: Guess what! You won’t believe your
eyes, but…

Talking about me: - I’m quite cheerful, but sometimes I

Speaking about a past experience:
Hopes:
Expressing sympathy:
Making an invitation:
get in a bad mood.
- I don’t like sports very much and I’m
quite unfit.
- I love School ....
- I’m obsessed with pop music.
- I’m crazy about shopping! I spend a
lot of time
Last week I went/saw/visited, etc
It was fantastic!
I had a great time.
I really enjoyed....because I love ...
My favourite part was...
I liked...best.
The best thing was...
First,/Then,/ Afterwards/Later/In
the end.
I hope you have a wonderful time
I’m sure you will enjoy it.
It’s a shame...
I’m sorry to hear that...
I’m sorry to hear about...
I’m sure you will do better next time.
Why don’t we…? Would you like to…?
Why don’t you visit me in...?

Closing remark: I hope you can make it.

It would be lovely to
see you.
Hope you can make it. It’ll be great
fun!
Accepting an invitation: Thanks a lot for the invitation. I’d love
to come…

Refusing an invitation: Thanks a lot for the invitation but I

won’t be able to make it since…
Closing remark: Sorry again. May be next time!

Giving recent news: I must tell you about.../ I’ve just come
back from...
Asking for advice: I’ve got a problem and I think you can
help!

Closing remark: Write back son and tell me what you

think!

Giving advice: I think you should…

Let me know what happens!

Thanking somebody Thanks a lot for….
Thanks so much for sending...
Apologising I’m really sorry about…
Congratulating somebody I’m just writing to say well done!
The letter should look like this:

Dear _____,

Introduction.……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Topic 1 ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Topic 2 ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Closing remarks ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Ending, Name
Match the feelings to the reasons, then make sentences, as in the example.

homesick a the city never sleeps

pleased b there's more crime in the city

unsafe because c there are always new things to do

disgusted as g I miss my friends and my old neighbourhood

excited - e there's rubbish everywhere

E.g. I feel homesick because I miss my friends and my old neighbourhoo

 WRITING STORIES

A story can roughly be divided into the following parts:

• Title: The title should either summarize the whole story (without spoilers!) or
have something to do with the main theme.

• Exposition: This is the beginning of the story, where the characters and setting
are established. It serves as the introduction to the next part, the action, and the
so-called conflict of our story.

• Action: In this part, the characters deal with conflict and do things to solve it.

• Resolution: This is where the conflict is resolved and the story concludes with
an ending, normally without any loose ends and the feelings.

THE CALL

I felt nervous when the phone rang. It was midnight and I was trying to sleep.
Who could it be? I tried to go back to sleep but it was impossible.

I got up and ran to the phone. However, as I was running, the phone stopped
ringing. I was angry, but I decided to go to bed again. When I was falling asleep,
the phone started ringing again. “Oh, my God! This is so annoying”!, I thought. This
time I picked up the phone quickly and shouted “Hello?!”. Nobody said anything at
first, but all of a sudden I heard, “Happy birthday, brother!”.

I had completely forgotten that it was my birthday. My sister was always the
first person to congratulate me.

In the example above you can see the different parts of a story very well
defined. Just like with emails or letters, your story should be visually appealing.
For this reason I recommend the following:

• Write your title in capital letters.

• Leave a clear space between paragraphs.

Expressions to use in your story

Beginning a story

When you start a story, if the first sentence isn’t given to you, you can use
phrases like these:

• It all began...
• When I first...
• At the beginning...
• It was a hot/cold summer/winter day.

Time phrases

One of the great differences between writing a letter, essay, article and so on,
and writing a story is the need to pay careful attention to the time over which
the story develops. In order to define the order of the events in the story, we
must use time expressions or time phrases. So let’s see a few:

• Then
• After that
• Not long aftewards
• As soon as
• While
• Meanwhile
• As
• Some time later
• A little later
• ____ minutes later
• Later (that morning/afternoon/day/night...)
• Just then
• a moment later

Linking ideas in a storY

● Beforehand
● Meanwhile
● In the meantime
● Afterwards
● Finally – In the end
● before – while – when – after – as soon as
● suddenly – all at once – out of the blue
● un / luckily – un / fortunately
● strangely enough –
 ● To my surprise / disappointment / relief -

Creating suspense

When writing a story, the aim is not to inform or to convey information; the real
purpose is to entertain the reader, just like when you read a novel you expect to
be entertained. For this reason, a story should aim to do so: entertain. And a cool
way to entertain is to create suspense, which we can do by using some of the
following expressions:

• Suddenly
• All of a sudden
• Without warning
• Just at that moment
• Unexpectedly
• Out of the blue
• Out of nowhere
• Right away

Direct speech

In every story there are characters and they usually interact with each other,
so it is always good if you know how to use direct speech, that is, reproduce the
words the characters actually say or think. The tricky bit about this is the
punctuation and the verbs to choose, because it’s good to use some verbs other
than “say”. Let’s take a look at some examples:

• “I’m coming with you,” she said.

• She said, “I’m coming with you.”

• “Do you like it?” he asked.

• “Don’t do it!” he screamed.

Pay close attention at where the comma (,) or other punctuation marks go (?, !).
Also, don’t forget to use inverted commas (“...”) to enclose the direct speech.
In British English we normally use single inverted commas (‘...’), but it’s not
important so choose the one that suits you best.

Finishing your story

This paragraph, the resolution, should be separated from the rest, and it’s a good
idea to start it with one of the following expressions:

• In the end
• Finally
• When it was all over
• Eventually
• After everything that happened
• Luckily

Verb tenses

One of the reasons why stories are particularly challenging for students is that
they tend to take place in the past, which makes it necessary to use a range of
past tenses approriately. The main three past tenses you should really try to
use are the following:

• Past simple (-ed/irregular form)

• Past continuous

• Past perfect

• Past simple and continuous:

It was midnight and I was trying to sleep.

• Past perfect and simple:

I had completely forgotten it was my birthday.

• Past simple:

This time I picked up the phone quickly and shouted, “Hello?!”.

So that’s how you should try to tell your story. Please avoid a simple succession of
past simple tenses alone, like:

I woke up and got out of bed. Then I went to the kitchen and made some coffee.

Summary:

Paragraph 1: When? Where? Who?

Paragraph 2: What happened?

Paragraph 3: How did it end? How did you feel?

Use:

Connectors:

● TIME: before long, when, as soon as, just as, while, some time later, at the
beginning, at first, in the end, eventually, at last, etc.
 ● CONTRAST: but, however, although.

● RESULT: for this reason, so.

Direct speech: remember to use SAID, ASKED, TOLD (direct speech is used with
inverted commas “”)

Interesting expressions and vocabulary:

● It was too good to be true

● I couldn’t believe my eyes/ears
● It was a narrow escape
● It made me jump
● It was a real shock
● It happened out of the blue
● Without any warning,…
● To my surprise,
● I flushed with embarrassment

AFTER writing, check if you included these things:

o The three basic narrating tenses.

o Connectors.

o Interesting vocabulary and expressions.

o Direct speech.

o Right punctuation.

o Right paragraph division.

o Suspense in the introduction.

o Climax.