This resource focuses on narrative writing, asking pupils to create a story about discovering a new world through a portal. It provides practical tools to assess pupils against the Key Stage 2 writing Teacher Assessment Framework (TAF) for working towards, expected and greater depth standards.
The resource pack offers a structured approach to cross-curricular writing, combining geographical knowledge, descriptive language, dialogue and independent research.
Pupils are guided with success criteria and checklists while teachers are supported with clear assessment guidance, in line with the recommendation that “pupils’ writing, on which teachers base their judgements, must be produced independently.”
This writing activity works well within a geography unit, where pupils can describe the physical and human features of a new world. It can also be used as a standalone narrative activity to provide further independent writing evidence.
Pupils will need knowledge of geographical features, relevant vocabulary and narrative techniques to create engaging, detailed writing.
TAF statements covered
Working Towards Standard (WTS)
- Use paragraphs to organise ideas.
- Describe settings and characters.
Expected Standard (EXS)
- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere in narratives.
- Integrate dialogue in narratives to convey characters and advance actions.
- Use a range of cohesive devices (e.g., conjunctions, adverbials, pronouns, synonyms) within and across paragraphs.
Greater Depth Standard (GDS)
- Write effectively for a range of purposes and audiences, selecting the appropriate form and drawing independently on what they have read as models for their own writing (e.g., characterisation).
Pack contents
- Personal writing skills checklist – encourages pupils to monitor and edit their own writing.
- Narrative writing skills checklist – lists features of narrative writing for independent editing.
- Features of a Portal Story poster – outlines key features of portal stories to support planning.
- Cohesive Devices poster – shows examples of cohesive devices pupils could use.
- Using Dialogue posters – examples of dialogue to convey character and advance action.
- Magical portal image – inspires fantastic writing.
- New world image cards – support geographical description and creative ideas.
- Narrative planning sheet – helps pupils structure ideas and plan paragraphs.
- Themed writing paper – PDF for drafting the final story.
- Teacher assessment sheets – track evidence against TAF standards; can be placed in pupils’ books as a record.
Suggested teaching approach
Begin by exploring the magical portal image and new world image cards, discussing what the world might look like and what pupils might see, hear and feel. Orally rehearse travelling through the portal using cohesive devices to link ideas and share descriptive vocabulary.
Next, pupils will consider the geographical features of the new world. Using the image cards, they will describe physical and human features, annotating the images and compiling a class list of vocabulary.
Then, pupils will plan their narrative using the planning sheet, thinking carefully about characters, settings and how they will describe the journey. They will refer to the Features of a Portal Story poster and Using Dialogue posters to include characterisation, dialogue and action.
After planning, pupils will draft their narrative, applying descriptive language, first-person or third-person perspective, dialogue and cohesive devices. Give feedback on planning or rehearsal as needed to support independent writing.
Finally, pupils will review and edit their writing independently or in pairs using the checklists, while you will assess their work against the Year 6 TAF statements.
Browse more Year 6 SATs TAF Evidence resources.