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Characterisation
What does this term mean?
Characterisation
Characterisation is a word
that describes how the
author develops the
personality of the story
characters in a story.
In most stories the
characters seem to steer
the events in a story, for a
good writer will make
characters behave in
different ways.
Today we are going to learn:
• How character’s are described in stories.
• How to create our own story characters.
• How we can show a character’s personality in
our own stories.
Characterisation comes though
what characters…
say
do
Characters become real life breathing people to our reader if we
describe decisions they make, what they say and how they say it.
Sometimes a writer will reveal also the thoughts which run
through a character’s mind.
Top Tips for creating characterisation.
Tip One
Use an unusual name. Use
description, alliteration,
nicknames.
Example
Biscuits was too large for the t-shirt he wore. Bits of him
bulged out in unlikely places. But he didn’t seem to
care. His round, red face grinned at me. “Hiyah!” said
Biscuits, thrusting his pudgy hand our towards mine.
Contrasting characters
Tip Two
A simple contrast is most effective. One character could
be gentle, the other harsh.
How do the characters in the text below contrast?
Example
The Grabber stood blocking their way. Tom
hesitated, then turned on his heal and
rushed back up the corridor screaming.
Victor picked up the whalebone wand. He
faced the Grabber and without saying a
word gazed deep into its eyes.
Using what characters do.
Tip Three
We should be able to describe our character’s feelings by what
they do. Take care not to write over simplified sentences
such as He was sad. He was angry.
Example
Grandma gently took the box
from its secret place in the
wardrobe. Immediately her eyes
began to prickle. She opened
the lid carefully and took in the
familiar scent.
Using what a character says.
Tip Four
Dialogue. To show fear h-h-hesitate, um, er.
Show power, confidence. Begin sentences with imperative
verbs (bossy verbs) Or I, I , I.
Use synonyms for said.
Example
The old king stood up and gazed
around the room. Everyone fell
silent. “I will not wait,” he roared.
“I must have porridge! And I
want it now!”
Your turn.
Partner work.
• Tip One – Create a name for your characters.
• Tip Two - Think of a contrast between your
character’s personalities.
Shy
Angry
confident
sweet
Clever dick
brave
lonely
troublemaker
nervous
happy
bullying
bossy
thoughtful
kind
gentle
stupid
sensitive
Now time to become actors. You need to assume the character’s name
and personality.
The plot
You and your partner are cousins. You are in one of
your homes, in the bedroom. The parents are
downstairs.
There is a creak from the room above,the attic. It should
be empty. What will your characters do?
Use Tip three – showing
characterisation through
what your characters DO.
Tip four – showing
characterisation by what
your characters SAY.
Use drama to act out the actions and dialogue of your characters.
The plot continued…
You are in the attic. It is
very dusty, full of
cobwebs, spiders etc. Its
difficult to see as when
you tried the light it
flashed one and
flickered out. You are
surrounded by a mass of
boxes and strange
shaped objects draped
in cloth.
You hear a noise coming
from the back of the
room…
Let’s write it!
Can you remember the four top tips?
Tip One Interesting names
Tip Two Contrasting personalities
Tip Three What your characters do
Tip Four What your characters say
Lesson 2
What were our top tips for
developing characters?
Tip One Interesting names
Tip Two Contrasting personalities
Tip Three What your characters do
Tip Four What your characters say
Today we are going to learn
Top Tip Number 5
• How to develop characterisation through
showing our character’s thoughts.
Thinking about thoughts
Example
Mrs Cooper pursed her lips. She had had enough of Brian’s
behaviour for one day. That boy ought to be taught a lesson.
He had overstepped the mark once too often. And bullying
was not something that Mrs Cooper was going to tolerate.
This shows how you can write down what is in our character's
mind.
We also can have a character’s thoughts written down as though
in speech - a thought is our mind speaking to ourselves.
“Oh no, she’s in a strop… again!” Brian thought. “She’s really got
it in for me these days.”
• In the following extract of text think
about how or if, the writer has used any
of the 5 top tips for characterisation.
Tip One Interesting names
Tip Two Contrasting personalities
Tip Three What your characters do
Tip Four What your characters say
Tip Five What our characters think.
Conkered!
“ You dirty, rotten thief!”
Billy Wilson was really winding me up. I don’t usually kick-off like that but
he was slouching on the playground bench swinging MY prize conker
back and forth, back and forth with a really irritating smirk on his face.
“Prove it Spud!” snarled Billy.
That’s me, Spud, A.K.A Edward King. Get it? Edward King – King Edward.
What were my parents thinking?
“All conkers look the same, don’t they?” he droned on.
“No they don’t! That’s mine. I’d recognise it anywhere.”
My Nan had given me he string for it. She’d found it in Grandpa’s old shed.
It was old and yellow and waxy and she said it would never, ever snap.
It was wrapped around an old tobacco tin, and as she unwound it, she
looked sad with a far away look in her eyes.
“There you go, Edward lad, That’s championship string, that is.
Your dad used it for his conkers too.” She held the old tin to her nose
before placing it gently back on the cobwebby shelf.
This all happened the day before the annual conker competition. Billy
Wilson couldn’t be bothered to find his own conkers, so he’d stolen mine
from my bag. He stole a lot of things, Billy did, and he couldn’t be bothered
to do anything much most of the time, including having a wash. Mum says
it’s not his fault and it’s not surprising, considering.
“Considering what?” I’ve asked a thousand times.
“None of your business,” she always says.
I couldn’t complain to the teachers about my stolen conker because we
weren’t supposed to have them in school. Health and safety, or something.
You can have an eye out with a conker, apparently!
Did you spot any Top Tips?
1. NAMES: Who do you think were the main
characters?
2. CONRAST: Were their personalities
different?
3. ACTIONS: Did the author show the
characters were different though their
actions? (What they did)
4. SPEECH: Did the author show how the
characters were different though what they
said?
5. THOUGHTS: Do we know what Spud thinks
about Billy?
Drama time
• With a partner you are going to act out the story so
far.
• We are going to freeze the action at different parts
of the action.
• When I say freeze frame create a pose using your
body, and a facial expression to show your feelings.
• I want you to think about your character’s thoughts
at that moment in the story.
Make a thought
bubble to describe
your character’s
thoughts.
Punctuating thoughts
Flashback
• A flashback is where you go back in time to
something that has happened in the past.
• Think about the character Billy Wilson.
• What in his life could have caused him to steal,
become lazy and unwashed?
• What might Spud’s mum have meant by, “It’s not
surprising, considering.”
Improvise a scene from the past that hints at why
Billy has become the character he is now.
Lesson 3
We are going to:
• use drama to explore character’s thoughts.
• use our top tips for characterisation in our
own writing.
Together we are going to write a recount,
describing the day of one of the characters in
the story we have been reading.
What were our top tips for
developing characters?
Tip One Interesting names
Tip Two Contrasting personalities
Tip Three What your characters do
Tip Four What your characters say
Tip Five What your characters think.
Who is Billy?
We have been looking at a short story with
two boys, Billy and Spud as the main
characters.
With your response partner talk for a few
moments about the character of Billy.
Is it fair to say that Billy is evil? What do
you think?
Why did Billy steal the conker?
Now the class are going to think about what
must have been going through Billy’s mind
before he stole the Conker.
Team 1.
List all the reasons why Billy might think it was
ok to steal.
Team 2.
List all the reasons why Billy might think he
should not steal the conker.
Let’s try out your ideas in a conscience alley!
Which team is most persuasive?
Are there any volunteers to be Billy?
Inside Billy’s Brain…
Let’s pretend that we are Billy.
• We are going to write an entry into Billy’s diary.
Writing Targets
• We need to describe an event in Billy’s life. (Action)
(Dialogue)
• Let the reader know how Billy feels about that day.
(Thoughts)
• Reveal something about Billy’s character to our
reader. (Personality)
Your task To develop characters in our writing.
Now I’d like you to write another diary entry into Billy’s diary.
What will you need to include to develop characterisation?
Describe Billy’s personality through:
• What Billy does
• What Billy says
• What Billy thinks.
How do you feel about the character of
Billy now?
• Do you feel sympathetic towards his
situation?
• What do you want to happen next to the
character?
• Can you remember the clue that the writer
gave us, that suggested that there was more
to Billy than Spud understood?
Lesson 4 Developing Characters
To use different ways of planning stories
• Now its time to go back
to our story.
• What has happened so
far?
• What do you think is
going to happen next?
Talk to your response partner.
How can we plot our story line in a different way?
high
Low
The story continues…
• Think about Spud’s emotions in the
following events.
• Following reading this segment of the
story, we are going to then focus upon
the character of Spud and describe the
events from his point of view.
Conkered continued!
Anyway, there was nothing I could do. Billy is a big lad and I’m
not. So, I decided to go home to look for another conker.
I went through the park and rummaged about underneath the conker trees.
It didn’t take me long to find an absolute beauty.I rubbed it on my
trousers and polished it up into a glossy swirl of browns and golds. This
would be a winner and Billy Wilson wouldn’t be smirking tomorrow. I
called at my Gran’s on the way home for some more string.
“Eh Edward lad,” she said, “you took the last of it yesterday. It’s
all gone.” My heart sank. It was special string – string that my dad had
won competitions with. It would never, ever snap.
“Never mind Gran,” I sighed. “My Mum’ll have some. See you
later!”
Sure enough Mum had something that would do the trick – an old
shoelace. First of all we followed the old recipe of soaking the conker in
malt vinegar for exactly two minutes and baking in the oven at 250
degrees for one minute and thirty seconds. My dad drilled a hole
though my conker with a sharp nail and threaded the shoelace though,
making a big knot on the end so that it wouldn’t come loose. I was
disappointed not to have the traditional family string but I was still
determined to beat Billy Wilson.
The next morning at playtime, we all gathered behind the school kitchens.
The smell of cabbage was belching out of the extractor fan making
school dinners seem even less tempting that usual. Everyone was
comparing conkers and eyeing up the opposition. Marcus Jones was
look-out. His parents wouldn’t let him play conkers because they said
competing with other children was bad for you. That must make the
reset of us really bad because we were always challenging each other
to dares and bets and daft races. Anyway, he’d have to stand on a box
he’s so small.
“All clear!” whispered Marcus.
We paired up and tossed coins to see who would go first and then we were
off.
Hot seating
What is Spud thinking?
What questions would
you ask Spud if your
met him?
To describe Character thoughts and feelings.
Spud’s Diary
Write a diary entry which reveals more of how Spud feels
about the recent events.
Include: His reactions to what others say to him, do to him.
The events…
He felt sad that he
He found another
could not get the
conker
string.
He thought about
Billy’s reaction to
the new conker
He tried to get
some more string.
His family helped
him prepare the
conker.
To use drama to explore texts
• Today we are going to read the ending
of our story.
• After we have completed reading the
story we are going to think about acting
out the story for someone else to watch.
Conkered continued!
I held out my conker, steadying the string it wouldn’t move.
Josh Walton drew back his conker, took aim and swung at mine.
They crashed together and Josh was left with a piece of string
with fragments of smashed conker clinging to the end.
“One-er!” I announced. A long way to go yet, though.
the competition continued until there were only two whole
conkers left. We all stood there; the ground covered with bits of
smashed conker and discarded pieces of string. Billy Wilson and
I faced each other both clutching ‘six-ers’ because we’d
smashed six other conkers. I went first. Drawing back the
beautiful conker, I took aim and swung. Just at the last minute,
Billy pulled his conker out of the way.
“Foul! Foul!” shouted Marcus. For someone who didn’t
compete , he had a pretty good grasp of the rules.
“Spud gets another go for that,” he said.
Again….pull back…aim…swing…CRASH! Both conkers were still
in one piece. Billy’s turn.
“Look out, Spud-face,” snarled Billy, “you’ve got no chance.” he
looked at me straight in the eyes with that horrid smirk across his podgy
face. He pulled grandpa’s special string slowly between his thumb and
forefinger, challenging me to say it was mine. Placing one foot in front
of the other and rocking to balance himself, Billy squared his shoulders,
pulled back his conker, aimed and swung. The conker flew through the
air across the playground, hitting the kitchen window with a crack. The
string had snapped! Grandpa’s special, waxy, unsnappable string had
snapped!
“Winner!” yelled Marcus, trying to hold my arm up like a champ.
“Conkered!” I shouted at Billy who had turned red and was
clenching his fists.
“Detention!” thundered Mr. Poskitt, the head teacher, as he
stormed around the corner. “Don’t you boys realise, you could have
your eye out playing conkers!”
The main events
Performance
• Now imagine that you are going to turn the
story into a performance for others to view.
• We need volunteers to play our main
characters.
• The rest of you are going to act as the
directors of the play.
• It is your job to direct the actor’s
movements, speech.
What have you learned this week in literacy?
• Talk to your response partner.
• Can you remember the 5 top tips for
characterisation?