Grade 7 Creative Writing: Ten Model Compositions

Ten model compositions of about a hundred and ten words, one step beyond Grade 6. The sentences begin to join with but and because, a line of speech appears here and there, and each piece turns once - something changes between the beginning and the end.

The English stays inside what a Grade 7 second-language learner already has. Nothing here needs a dictionary.

In April we celebrate the Sinhala and Tamil New Year. It is my favourite time of the year.

My mother starts cooking two days before. She makes kavum, kokis and milk rice. Our whole house smells sweet.

On the day we wear new clothes. My grandmother lights the hearth at the right time and we eat together.

After lunch the games begin in our lane. There is a pillow fight on a pole and a race with a spoon. Last year I won the running race for my age group.

In the evening we visit our relatives. Everybody gives something small to the children.

The best part is not the sweets. It is that everybody is at home on the same day.

I live in a small village near Kurunegala. About sixty families live here.

There is one road through the village. On both sides there are paddy fields, and beyond the fields there is a low hill.

We have a temple, a school and three small shops. The bus comes six times a day. If you miss the last one at six o'clock you must walk.

Everybody knows everybody. When somebody is ill, three neighbours come to help before the doctor does.

In the city there is more to do. But in my village, if I shout from our gate, four people will answer.

That is why I like it here.

Last August my uncle took us to Negombo. It was my first time at the sea.

The water was warmer than I expected. My cousin ran straight in but I walked slowly because I was afraid.

A wave came and knocked me down. I swallowed some water and it tasted terrible. Everybody laughed, and after a moment I laughed too.

We built a small house with sand. The sea washed it away twice, so we built it further back.

In the evening we ate rice packets on the sand and watched the fishing boats go out.

My hair was full of salt for two days. I did not mind.

Our class played Grade 7B last Friday. We had practised for two weeks.

They batted first and made forty-two runs. We thought it would be easy.

Then we lost three wickets in the first two overs. Nobody talked after that.

I went to bat at number seven. My hands were wet. I hit two runs, then four, then I was bowled.

In the end we made thirty-nine. We lost by three runs.

Our captain said, "We lost, but we did not give up."

It is true. But three runs is a very small number, and I still think about my last ball.

My favourite teacher is Mrs Fernando. She teaches us English.

She is not the kindest teacher in our school and she is not the strictest. She is somewhere in the middle.

When a pupil gives a wrong answer she does not say "wrong". She says, "Tell me why you thought that." Then the pupil explains, and very often finds the mistake without help.

Last term I was afraid to speak English in class. She asked me a question every single day, always an easy one, until I forgot to be afraid.

I never told her that I noticed what she was doing.

I think she knows.

The electricity went off at seven o'clock, just when I opened my book.

My father found the candles and my mother found the matches. Soon there were three small lights in our house.

We could not watch television and I could not study. So we sat together on the floor.

My grandmother started telling stories about her childhood. She told us about a flood in 1978 when the water came into their kitchen.

We laughed a lot. My little sister fell asleep on my mother's lap.

At half past nine the lights came back and everybody stood up and went to their own room.

For two hours our house was different.

There is an old mango tree behind our house. My grandfather planted it before I was born.

It gives fruit in May. The mangoes at the top are the sweetest, but nobody can reach them except the crows.

When I was small I fell from the second branch and broke my arm. My mother said I must never climb it again. I climbed it again the next year.

Last month a storm broke one large branch. My father wanted to cut the tree down because it is old.

My grandmother said no.

The tree is still there. It is leaning a little, but in May there will be mangoes again.

I am never late for school. That is why nobody believed me on Monday.

Our alarm clock did not ring because the electricity was off in the night. I woke up at half past seven.

I did not eat. I put on my uniform, took my bag and ran to the bus halt. The bus had gone.

A man on a motorcycle saw my uniform and stopped. He was my neighbour's brother. He took me to school.

I reached the gate during assembly and stood at the back.

The teacher marked me late anyway.

It was not fair, but I understood. She cannot check every story.

My bicycle is not new. My cousin used it for four years and then he grew too tall for it.

When my father brought it home the chain was broken and there was rust on the handlebar. We cleaned it together on a Sunday.

Learning to ride was not easy. I fell many times and my knee still has a mark from the third fall.

My father held the seat and ran behind me. One day I turned around and he was standing far away, smiling.

Now I ride to the shop and to my friend's house.

It is old and it makes a noise when I brake. It is the best thing I own.

Last month my mother and I went to the town to buy books. On the way back we could not find our purse.

We had no money for the bus. It was four o'clock and our home is eleven kilometres away.

My mother did not cry but her face changed.

A woman at the bus halt was watching us. She was old and she was selling plantains. She came and gave my mother two hundred rupees.

My mother said she would return it. The woman said, "Somebody helped me once."

We went back the next week with the money. She was not there, and the other sellers did not know her name.

• Ask where the story turns. Every piece below changes direction once. Finding that moment is the lesson; a story without one is a list.
• Count the sentences, not the words, first. Ten to fourteen sentences makes a hundred and ten words. A pupil who knows that stops panicking about length.
• Give the dialogue away. One line of speech lifts a composition. Two pages of it sink one.
• Set a different title from the model so the class writes rather than remembers.
• Mark two things. The best sentence, and the one mistake that matters most in that piece.