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Short story option for HL English?
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15-05-2012 8:28pm#1
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Structure structure structure! Examiners like to see that you can lay out a story that has a beginning, middle and end (or a plot). If you have stylistic flair, that's great! But focus on getting your structures down to a tee before you go off making wild stylistic leaps of faith (trust me, I do those enough to know by now to stay away from them :pac:). Overall I think the examiner wants to see that you can develop a few different aspects of a story (character, setting, plot, atmosphere), along with a bit of flair too. I get almost full marks in most of my essays by just planning out my short stores beforehand like this.
Hope that helps! 0 -
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SureYWouldntYa wrote: »Best thing for the short story is to be original.
Our teacher showed us an story from 09. Hardly any structure, one paragraph 1 1/2 pages and next one 6 lines, etc. Terrible essay from that point. The important decision the character had to make was whether the woman got treatment for her cancer and baby died or let baby live. Ended on a cliffhanger.
This person got 100/100 for her essay.
Shows that sometimes being pure original and genius works
Ive always been original enough I think in my essays .. I write the kinda stories I like to read .. deep, realistic, kinda shocking all that, but Ive never got high marks in them. Then again my teachers an ass.
Spose it depends on the examiners preferences too?
Maybe I just need to introduce a bit more structure, best of both worlds!
Cheers!0 -
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I did that question the other day.. Started off in a morgue and used flashback technique to tell the story of how the protagonist's mother died and how it changed his life... was pretty happy with it so hopefully it gets a high mark when it comes back corrected!implausible wrote: »Why?
What did you do in your mock? Knowing this will help.
Some people saying go for the originality, others against it.
The title was something like the main character had to undergo some signifigant change or something.
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Hmm, well technically shes already undergone the change. I made the same mistake in my mock but I had the other one, and I chose "Write a modern love story" - but it was a date so my teacher said it didnt fit with the title. They're getting really picky with how well you fit with the title.
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Just wondering do you need to have a story already prepared before going into the exam and then you have to try and fit it in to whichever title comes up?
I usually get ideas from the title the but my teacher said if you do the short story you must have a story already prepared. Do you have to???
I would but I wonder that the title won't fit in to the story and I'll have to change it.
And you know the change does it have to be personality wise?0 -
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Why limit yourself? Its always best to have choice I'd be careful about a broad story, they're apparently making it harder to get high marks in the stories now because people were rote-learning them, I'd say do a few theme-specific ones with a wide variety of events 0
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Why limit yourself? Its always best to have choice I'd be careful about a broad story, they're apparently making it harder to get high marks in the stories now because people were rote-learning them, I'd say do a few theme-specific ones with a wide variety of events
I'm not sure what to write about the story I wrote but I did that in exam condition mode timed myself planning and everything .
It was in first person and the woman was a business woman and that day she found out the business might be closing down and she was worried about what would happen if it does and as her husband lost his job and the son is doing well in school she doesn't want to let them down. But other workers are fired instead the business closes down and the boss offers her a the same job but she has to move to the job as thats where the business is moving to. The husband has only recently gotten a new job that he loves and he quits. The son gets used to the idea of moving and didn't like it at the start . Then they move and thats where it ended.
I'm not sure if thats a good plot?? I've been thinking it's not bad but could maybe add something into it as I don't know if it has a major theme .0 -
You could have a lot of themes in there like decisions, moving, jobs, family, challenges, but what I'd do is try to split it up a little. For example if the title in June was something like "a story where a job is lost" focus more on the job being lost than the son doing well in school, but if it said something like "Where a character changes his/her mind" (bad title but just for the example!) you'd focus more on the son coming around to the idea of moving, but itd need to be more central to the plot.
Hope that made sense 0 -
You could have a lot of themes in there like decisions, moving, jobs, family, challenges, but what I'd do is try to split it up a little. For example if the title in June was something like "a story where a job is lost" focus more on the job being lost than the son doing well in school, but if it said something like "Where a character changes his/her mind" (bad title but just for the example!) you'd focus more on the son coming around to the idea of moving, but itd need to be more central to the plot.
Hope that made sense
I was thinking maybe having a character get sick the title was called "the decisive moment" . Oh yeah maybe if I made the family more challenging it was just a happy family really apart from the dad losing his job the woman was providing for the whole family. I'm not sure what change I'd make to the woman who's the main speaker where the character has to undergo a change. I tried to make her a someone who's like in love with their job possibly I could maybe make the family be annoyed at her spending so much time working and she'll have to change and focus more on the family and not just the job :S.0 -
If you wanted to focus in on a change occurring, and make it dramatic which examiners apparently like, you could do something like one loses their job and then the other falls slowly out of love with them...bit dramatic, you'd probably have to break it up a lot, I think the workaholic thing sounds easier and better. :PMysteriouschic wrote: »I was thinking maybe having a character get sick the title was called "the decisive moment" . Oh yeah maybe if I made the family more challenging it was just a happy family really apart from the dad losing his job the woman was providing for the whole family. I'm not sure what change I'd make to the woman who's the main speaker where the character has to undergo a change. I tried to make her a someone who's like in love with their job possibly I could maybe make the family be annoyed at her spending so much time working and she'll have to change and focus more on the family and not just the job :S.
I sometimes use flashbacks for a more complicated story or just break it up with "***" to show that time has passed, not 100% sure if you can do that but I dont see why not You could do it day by day shes coming home later, talking to them less, doing more work, and the unexpected change could even be that she realizes she needs more time for her family, its pretty workable. (pun not intended 
) 0 -
If you wanted to focus in on a change occurring, and make it dramatic which examiners apparently like, you could do something like one loses their job and then the other falls slowly out of love with them...bit dramatic, you'd probably have to break it up a lot, I think the workaholic thing sounds easier and better. :P
I sometimes use flashbacks for a more complicated story or just break it up with "***" to show that time has passed, not 100% sure if you can do that but I dont see why not You could do it day by day shes coming home later, talking to them less, doing more work, and the unexpected change could even be that she realizes she needs more time for her family, its pretty workable. (pun not intended )
It has to be over 3 days or less my teacher says it's harder to make it any longer so something which can occur over 2-3 days. Yeah I am slightly going towards to workaholic thing. I was actually trying to make the character have the personality traits of Simon Cowell lol.0 -
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