This document provides guidance for a Year 10 creative writing unit on recreating texts. It includes an analysis of the poem "Out of the Blue" by Simon Armitage about 9/11. Students are instructed to choose a perspective to recreate the events of 9/11 depicted in the poem. Suggested perspectives include an onlooker, reporter, victim, survivor, or relative. The document emphasizes developing writing skills like sentence structure, punctuation, and grammar for the assessment.

1. Creative Writing Unit 3b
Year 10

2. What do you think
of when you
someone says, “It
happened out of
the blue.”

3. Unit 3: Part b: Producing creative texts (creative writing) Re-creations. Taking a text and turning it into another
.
.
“Re-creations :
Taking a text
and turning it
into another ”
Controlled Assessment.

4. Success Criteria
Band 3 – ‘Clear, Consistent’
• Cleat links between sentences;
some discourse markers to create
fluency.
• Consistent accuracy with greater
range of punctuation.
Band 4 – ‘Confident, Assured’
• Phrase and sentence constructions
self-consciously crafted for effect.
• full range of punctuation marks
used assuredly and accurately.
Band 5 – ’Sophisticated, Impressive’
• High levels of whole text coherence.
• Varied and sophisticated sentence
structures used to impressive effect.
Success Criteria
Learning Outcomes
• Identify the success criteria for
Producing creative texts.
• Evaluate the best examples of
descriptive language and prioritise
which are most effective.
• Peer assess the work of others.
PROGRESS
English Language Unit 3 (b) Producing creative texts. Controlled Assessment
Learning Objective
LO1: To explore the poem ‘Out of the Blue’
by Simon Armitage.
LO2: Develop skills in creative and
descriptive writing in preparation for the
Controlled Assessment on “Re-creations
: Taking a text and turning it into
another ’

5. Unit 3: Part b: Producing creative texts Re-creations : Taking a text and turning it into another
2012/2013 Bank
Unit 3: Part b: Producing creative texts
Re-creations : Taking a text and turning it into another
1200 words over 2 Controlled Assessments = approx 600 words per CA

6. What do you
think
when you see
these
images?

7. This is how it was revealed to the UK
on September 11th 2001.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=449l-
QO93JU

8. • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yacjArDnRbY (Video)

9. Extract from 'Out of the Blue'
You have picked me out.
Through a distant shot of a building burning
you have noticed now
that a white cotton shirt is twirling, turning.
In fact I am waving, waving.
Small in the clouds, but waving, waving.
Does anyone see a
soul worth saving?
And when will you come?
Do you think you are watching, watching
a man shaking crumbs
or pegging out washing?
I am trying and trying.
The heat behind me is searing, searing,
but the white of surrender is not yet flying.
I am not at the point of launching, leaving.
http://www.helpmewithenglish.co.uk/page_2111251.html
A bird goes by.
The depth is appalling. Appalling
that others like me
should be wind-milling, wheeling, spiralling, falling.
Are your eyes believing,
believing?
Here in the gills
I am still breathing.
But tiring, tiring.
Sirens below me are wailing, firing.
My arm is numb and my nerves are sagging.
Do you see me, my love. I am failing. Flagging.

10. Out of the Blue
• This poem comes, as its title suggests, from the
much longer poem 'Out of the Blue' which
Simon Armitage wrote to commemorate the
victims of the attack on the World Trade Centre
in September 2001 known as 9/11 and the fall
of the Twin Towers.

11. Out of the Blue – Simon Armitage
• Some things that you might like to note about the poem... It is a monologue in four-line
stanzas, in the voice of one of the victims of the attack on the World Trade Centre in
September 2001 known as 9/11.
• Armitage has imagined himself into the place of one of the people involved, a man who
finds himself trapped on the top floors of the burning building, aware of his position,
but unable to escape. This situation was one of the ones which most horrified people
who watched footage of the attacks--people could be seen waving from windows,
looking for help, and yet there was no way to reach them before the towers collapsed.
• The speaker directly addresses us as readers throughout, actually making us feel slightly
voyeuristic (ghoulish) in watching this film, and selecting this person to watch: 'you
have picked me out / Through a distant shot of a building burning'. In this respect it is
interesting in that it deals with a non-combatant (combatant – someone taking part in
war), and a victim of conflict, though not a victim of a war, but of a terrorist attack. The
speaker's horror and disbelief are powerfully conveyed in the poem, and the extract
ends with the dark suggestion that his ability to keep speaking is disappearing 'I am
failing, flagging'.

12. Annotation of the poem
• Pronoun 'you' draws reader's focus
• white cotton shirt is the 'uniform' of the average office worker
• Man is waving for help, but is in an impossible situation where nobody can reach
him,
• He asks if anyone sees a soul worth saving, perhaps casting a judgement on his
life?
• Horrified at the thought that people are helpless to help him but watching him
nonetheless
• Wonders if people truly realise the horror of his situation
• The heat of the fires behind him drive closer towards death, even though he
refuses to give up and
• 'launch' himself into the air.
• A bird flies by highlighting his inability to save himself and the appalling height
of the building
• He sees other people falling and jumping from the windows
• He questions whether or not he is still alive and tries to imagine what others are
thinking as they look at him
• He reminds himself that he is still drawing breath
• The physical drain of holding on has taken it strain, his arms and grip is failing.
• The poem ends on a 'cliffhanger'

13. Out of the Blue – Simon Armitage
.
.

15. Creative Writing
• What perspective could you recreate this story
from?

16. Unit 3: Part b: Producing creative texts Re-creations : Taking a text and turning it into another
• You could be an onlooker describing the events unfold?
• A reporter
• A victim in the twin towers
• A survivor
• A relative of a victim watching the events on tv etc…
• The child of a victim. You have never met your father /mother etc and wonder what they
were like…
• A teenager watching the news as it unfolds on the news in front of your very eyes…
• A doctor with someone telling their last moments….
The list is endless.
Pay attention to your writing skills: You will be marked on :
sentences structure, punctuation and grammar, etc..