Planning a composition in Primary 2

In Primary 1, students are required to write a few sentences based on one picture. In Primary 2, students are now faced with 4 sequenced pictures to a plot. This is a natural progression in schools to allow students to develop their English writing skills and enhance their plots and descriptions in their compositions. This change, however, can be daunting for some students. “I don’t know what to write about” is a common phrase that we hear our new lower primary students say. Fortunately, with weekly writing practices, our students adapt to the demands of Primary 2 Paper 1 component.

So, what is the first thing that we teach our students? Planning. At TF, we believe that Planning is the most important stage in composition writing. This is emphasized at all our levels. The advice I give my PSLE students every year is to take that 5 minutes to plan their stories even if they are confident of their plots. It is always better to plan instead of realising that they are out of point 30 minutes into the examination.

1. How do our P2 students plan their compositions?

1.1 Plot

Every composition should have an Introduction, Body, Ending.

We ask our students to reflect on the following questions:

What is the story about?

What is the Problem/ Rising Action?

What is the Solution/ Falling Action?

What is the ending?

1.2 Setting

Describing the setting of a story will allow students to learn how to be descriptive in a composition.

As students gain confidence in their writing skills, they begin to enjoy writing about different scenes and places, especially if they have visited the places themselves.

To kickstart them off in learning how to describe settings, we ask them the following questions:

What does the protagonist see?

What does the protagonist hear?

What does the protagonist feel?

These questions can be revisited throughout the story and not just in the Introduction of the story.

1.3 Characterisation

At TF, the characters in our students’ stories play an important role.

In our experience, examiners react well to compositions that portray realistic and descriptive characters.

The best characters are the ones who evolve from the start to the end of the story.

We ask our P2 students the following questions:

Who is the protagonist in the story?

Are there other characters?

What do they look like?

What are they feeling?

How do they behave to show what they are feeling?

What did the protagonist learn at the end of the story?

Once again these questions are asked again as students plan the Body and Ending of the story.

With these 3 points in mind, let us take a look at the composition below.

2. Composition planning example

2.1 Introduction (Picture 1)

Setting : The school canteen

See : bustling with students rushing to buy their food

Hear : loud chatter and laughter echoed in the canteen

Smell : the delicious aroma of chicken rice wafted through the air

Protagonist: Mary

Mary : A primary 2 student in a new school

Characterisation : Sweet but shy girl

Emotions : Feeling lonely as she had not made any friends in school yet

2.2 Body – Problem / Rising Action (Picture 2)

Problem : Mary slipped on a puddle of spilled juice. Her bowl of hot noodles flew in the air and landed all over the canteen. She scalded her hand.

Emotions : Embarrassed and in pain. Burst into tears.

2.3 Body – Solution / Falling Action (Picture 3)

Solution : Two of her classmates who witnessed the incident rushed forward to help her by…

Emotions : Relieved and grateful. Stopped crying and thanked them.

2.4 Ending – (Picture 4)

The two classmates invited Mary to sit with them. They chatted together. Mary learnt the importance of being careful in the school canteen.

Emotions : Happy

We hope that the tips above will help your child take the first step in writing a good composition.