Pre-writing activities in class –Talk about the terms “detective” and “witness” and what it means to be a detective or a witness. –Make a mindmap on the blackboard with important issues a detective has to sort out. –Focus on how to ask questions in English. –Write down examples of ways of asking questions. –Have a brainstorm about adjectives to be used in connection with murders and murderers. –Present the aims of the process. –Agree upon the criteria for evaluation.

The Murder Mystery The progression in the writing process Introduction of the game. “Random” sorting of the pupils – into detectives and witnesses. Play the game. Make sure the detectives take down notes when they interview the witnesses. Have pupils re-tell their story to the teacher –Homework: re-tell the story to someone in your family Write down the story based on the key words by hand – the two pupils (detective+witness) are working closely together to include all the details. Reveal how the witnesses were able to answer. Write the first draft of the story using a computer and the program “Word”. Use the spell check to correct possible mistakes.

The pupils get feedback from the teacher on the use of adjectives and possibly from another pupil on the details of the story –The teacher focuses on the use of adjectives. –The pupils ask each other questions to clarify i.e. murder weapon, time of day, the murderer etc. Write the final draft in “Word”. Retell the story to another pupil in class (one to one interaction of a familiar text). The written text can be used as notes. 2 and 2 of the pairs work together first to read the stories to one another. Then the pairs decide who has got the best story and finally they make a dramatisation to present to the rest of the class. Written and oral evaluation.