KS1 & KS2 English curriculum

This unit builds on pupils' knowledge of successful narrative writing from the Year 4 unit, 'The Happy Prince': narrative writing'. The unit centres on analysing parts of the film 'Whale Rider' to understand characters and how emotive scenes develop. When pupils are writing, there is an emphasis on using accurate punctuation when using direct speech sentences to build characterisation. A range of Year 4 sentence structures and show-not-tell devices are also taught. This unit prepares pupils for narrative writing in the Year 5 unit 'How to Train Your Dragon': diary and narrative writing'.

1. Learning about the context of 'Whale Rider'
2. Retelling the story of 'Whale Rider'
3. Exploring characters' perspectives
4. Practising writing direct speech for 'Whale Rider'
5. Planning the opening of 'Whale Rider'
6. Writing the opening of 'Whale Rider'
7. Planning a narrative scene with direct speech in 'Whale Rider'
8. Writing a narrative scene with direct speech in 'Whale Rider'
9. Editing paragraphs of a narrative in 'Whale Rider'
10. Planning an emotive narrative scene in 'Whale Rider'
11. Writing paragraph one of an emotive narrative scene in 'Whale Rider'
12. Writing paragraph two of an emotive narrative scene in 'Whale Rider'
13. Planning the resolution of 'Whale Rider'
14. Writing the resolution of 'Whale Rider'
15. Publishing and reading my 'Whale Rider' narrative aloud

• A narrative can be structured as an opening, build-up, climax and resolution.
• Each part of a story has a specific purpose and intended effect on the reader.
• The intended effect on the reader is achieved through careful vocabulary choices.
• Adjectives describe nouns and adverbials modify verbs.
• There are three main types of sentences: simple, compound and complex
• These must be punctuated accurately with a full stop, capital letter and a comma where needed.
• An adverbial complex sentence consists of a main clause and an adverbial subordinate clause.
• Speech first in a sentence must be punctuated with inverted commas (with a comma, question or exclamation mark before the closing inverted commas).