Story Writing

What is story?
Story is a piece of writing that describes a chain of related events. Every story is about one or more characters trying to deal with some sort of difficulty.

What is a story map?
A story map is a map that helps writer organise the story by focusing on characters, setting, and plot with some related series of events that starts with beginning, rising, climax and ending.

What is a story plot? What are the eight types of plot we can find in story?
A plot can be defined as the arrangement of narrative events in a story. It is usually organised in such a way as to create interest and involvement for the reader. It also helps to establish and emphasise causality. There are usually eight types of plot mapped by writer to devise the sequence of events in the story. The eight types of plot can be devised and mapped from:
1. problem to solution,
2. mystery to solution,
3. conflict to peace,
4. danger to safety,
5. confusion to order,
6. dilemma to decision,
7. ignorance to knowledge, and
8. questions to answers.

Task: Read the story, “The Fight”. Discuss the ways that the plot is developed by the writer. Fill in the story map at the end of the story.
Try to answer the following questions when you read the story.

• Who is the main character in the story?
• What is the setting of the story?
• What happen in the story? How did the writer arrange the development of its plot ? "My nose is bleeding! He hit me!”
  The nine-year-old boy, Jimmy was screaming, holding his bloodied nose, leaving a trail of blood to the bathroom. His seven-year-old brother, Michael, had punched on it, after an argument over control of the TV remote.
  
  Their mother, Mrs. Lam saw them fighting. Her first thought, on this day of long summer school break was, “It’s eight-thirty in the morning and these two are at fight again. I can’t go through another day like this.”
  
  Mrs. Lam sent Michael to his room for a time-out and got Jimmy cleaned up. Then she called both of them into her bedroom for a talk. She wasn’t angry with them, only disappointed in her leadership of their home; not able to help her sons live in harmony and work out their differences.
  
  Mrs. Lam sat between them with an arm around each. “Let’s talk about this. You are fighting and hitting a lot and it upsets all of us. Jimmy, would you tell Michael how you are feeling right now?”
  
  Jimmy stared at Michael and shouted, “My nose hurts! You hit me for no reason! You kept pinching me and I told you to stop! The only way to get your attention was to take the remote and then you hit on my face.”
  
  Michael was angry, too, and he started his rebuttal: “You always hit me!”
  Mrs. Lam interrupted Michael and asked him to repeat what he just heard Jimmy say.
  
  Michael said, “I’ve always got the remote and nobody likes me.”
  Mrs. Lam prompted Michael, “What else did you hear Jimmy say?”
  "His nose hurts and I was pinching him and he got in the way of my head," Michael said.
  
• "Jimmy, is that what you said,”
  "Yes. He didn’t have to smash my nose!”
  Mrs. Lam said, “How do you see what happened, Michael?”
  "Jimmy always gets to do anything he wants! When I’m watching TV he always turns the channel! When I’m playing with something, he takes it away and says it’s his!”
  
  Their mother said, “Jimmy, what did you hear Michael say?”
  
  “Michael thinks that I take over every thing and get to do anything I want.”
  “Is that right, Michael?”
  “Yeah.”
  They went through a few more rounds of “What did you hear him say and did he get it right?”
  The mood in their home changed for the positive in a few minutes. The boys started to look at each other, smile, and make jokes. The tension was gone and feelings were understood.
  
  Then Mrs. Lam asked, “The next time you guys disagree with the TV channel or anything else, what can you do besides hit?”
  
  Jimmy thoughtfully answered, “Go and do something else or talk to Mom or Dad.”
  Michael added, “Go outside or play with others.”
  "How about if you look at the TV listings for one or two programs each day and talk with each other ahead of time about what you want to watch?”
  "That’s a good idea!" They were through talking now.
  
  Mrs. Lam was amazed at how understanding each other’s feelings and viewpoints help solved the conflict and raised self-esteem. The boys saw themselves differently, more capable and in control because of the ideas they came up with.