- Define and explain Characters and Settings in your own words
- Use key terms such as character accurately
- Apply what you have learned to new examples and questions
- Avoid the common mistakes learners make with this topic
This lesson focuses on Characters and Settings: meet the people in stories and describe where their adventures happen.
Meet the people in stories and describe where their adventures happen.
Key ideas
Talk about how characters feel
Stories come alive when we think about feelings: a character might feel brave, scared, cross or kind. Asking how you would feel puts you inside the story and helps you understand why characters do what they do.
Stories follow a pattern
Most stories introduce a character and a setting, then something goes wrong in the middle, and the ending sorts it out. Spotting this beginning-middle-end pattern helps you remember stories and tell your own.
Key term — character: A person, animal or creature in a story. You can describe how a character looks, feels and behaves.
Who is the main character in The Lost Duckling?
The little duckling.
Answer: The little duckling.
- Forgetting to name the characters Say who the story is about at the start, for example: This story is about a little duckling.
- Telling events out of order Use the words first, then and finally to keep the beginning, middle and end in the right order.
Practice
At the pond.
The duckling wanders away and feels lost and lonely.
Happy and safe, because it is home with its mother.
The duckling wanders off, the frog helps, mother hugs the duckling.
Quick check
Which of these best defines "character"?
- Characters and Settings: meet the people in stories and describe where their adventures happen.
- Talk about how characters feel: Stories come alive when we think about feelings: a character might feel brave, scared, cross or kind.
- setting: Where and when a story happens.
- Watch out for: forgetting to name the characters