More practice with the language you're learning
Supplementary support — grammar, vocabulary, speaking and review — built from language already taught in the course. Not a lesson, and never a test.
1.Notice first: read these and say what they share — "**Distance — far**: 'From the doorway one might have observed a woman doing what she had done every Tuesday for eleven years.'" / "**Distance — close (free indirect)**: 'Bread again. Every Tuesday. Was that a life or a rehearsal for one?'" / "**Person — second**: 'You are the one who has been buying this bread for eleven years. You did not decide to be. It happened.'"
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Four moves at C2: (a) PICK THE DISTANCE — stand where you can see what only this distance can see; if you drift closer, do it on purpose and mark the move; (b) COMMIT TO THE PERSON — first, second and third are different instruments; switching mid-scene is a choice, not an accident; (c) TIME-MARK — past-looking-back permits reflection the character can't yet have; present-tense forbids it; write to your tense; (d) ACCESS — decide what your narrator is allowed to know and refuse to know the rest, even when it would be easier.
2.Rewrite the far-distance line as close-distance free indirect style (Elena's thought, but in third person).
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'Bread. Tuesday. Eleven years of it. Was this what she had become, or what she had always been?'
3.Rewrite the same moment in second person present.
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'You are in the queue. You are counting. You have not yet reached the counter, so you have not yet decided what the counting means.'
4.Rewrite in limited past, denying the narrator access to Elena's thoughts.
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'She stood in the queue. She was seen to count something on her fingers. Whether she knew what she was counting, no one in the bakery could have said.'
5.Sort these into "natural" and "not natural" and justify each decision out loud: "**Distance — far**: 'From the doorway one might have observed a woman doing what she had done every Tuesday for eleven years.'" · "**Distance — close (free indirect)**: 'Bread again. Every Tuesday. Was that a life or a rehearsal for one?'" · "**Person — second**: 'You are the one who has been buying this bread for eleven years. You did not decide to be. It happened.'" · "**Time — present**: 'She stands in the queue. She counts. She has not yet decided that this counting means anything, because she has not yet reached the counter.'"
6.Build three sentences on this pattern about your own week — one neutral, one emphatic, one tentative.
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Four moves at C2: (a) PICK THE DISTANCE — stand where you can see what only this distance can see; if you drift closer, do it on purpose and mark the move; (b) COMMIT TO THE PERSON — first, second and third are different instruments; switching mid-scene is a choice, not an accident; (c) TIME-MARK — past-looking-back permits reflection the character can't yet have; present-tense forbids it; write to your tense; (d) ACCESS — decide what your narrator is allowed to know and refuse to know the rest, even when it would be easier.
1.Fill: 'That paragraph is ____ ____ ____ — the syntax is hers, the person is his.' (3 words)
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free indirect style
2.Fill: 'Earn the ____. Don't tell me what she thinks in line one.' (1 word)
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interiority
3.Fill: 'That adjective is a ____ ____ — that's you, not her.' (2 words)
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voice leak
4.Complete in context: "Pick a ______ and hold it. Every drift has to be paid for."
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narrative distance
5.Complete in context: "That paragraph is ______ — the syntax is hers, the person is his."
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free indirect style
6.Complete in context: "Your narrator lost access on page two and then borrowed it back on page four. Pick."
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narrator access
7.Complete in context: "This is ______ — we don't get to know what he's thinking."
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limited third
8.Complete in context: "She's an unreliable narrator about her mother and she is completely trustworthy about the bakery."
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the unreliable narrator
9.Complete in context: "Hold the distance. Every accidental closeup costs the scene."
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to hold the distance
10.Complete in context: "Earn the interiority. Don't tell me what she thinks in line one."
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to earn the interiority
11.Complete in context: "That's ______. Mark it — a section break, a line break, or a paragraph that leans on the shift."
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a distance shift
12.Complete in context: "That adjective is ______ — that's you, not her."
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a voice leak
13.Complete in context: "You wrote in present but reflected in past. Write to the tense."
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to write to the tense
14.Cover the list. Which words can you still recall, and what does each one add that a simpler word wouldn't?
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narrative distance — how close the reader is standing to the character's consciousness — from ceiling-camera far to inside-the-skull close | free indirect style — third-person narration that carries the character's voice, thought-shape and idiom without quotation marks | narrator access — what the narrator is permitted to know — one mind, all minds, or none | limited third — third-person narration confined to one character's consciousness | the unreliable narrator — a first-person or close-third voice whose account the reader is invited to distrust in a specific direction | to hold the distance — to keep the chosen narrative distance across a whole scene rather than drifting closer or further by accident | to earn the interiority — to give the reader a character's inside thought only after the outside behaviour has justified it | a distance shift — a deliberate, marked move from one narrative distance to another mid-scene | a voice leak — an unintentional intrusion of author, character or narrator where they don't belong | to write to the tense — to use only the reflection or foresight the chosen tense permits
1.Give two natural word partners for "narrative distance" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: Pick a narrative distance and hold it. Every drift has to be paid for.
2.Give two natural word partners for "free indirect style" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: That paragraph is free indirect style — the syntax is hers, the person is his.
3.Give two natural word partners for "narrator access" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: Your narrator lost access on page two and then borrowed it back on page four. Pick.
4.Give two natural word partners for "limited third" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: This is limited third — we don't get to know what he's thinking.
5.Give two natural word partners for "the unreliable narrator" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: She's an unreliable narrator about her mother and she is completely trustworthy about the bakery.
6.Give two natural word partners for "to hold the distance" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: Hold the distance. Every accidental closeup costs the scene.
7.Give two natural word partners for "to earn the interiority" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: Earn the interiority. Don't tell me what she thinks in line one.
8.Give two natural word partners for "a distance shift" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: That's a distance shift. Mark it — a section break, a line break, or a paragraph that leans on the shift.
9.Give two natural word partners for "a voice leak" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: That adjective is a voice leak — that's you, not her.
10.Give two natural word partners for "to write to the tense" (adjective + noun, verb + noun, or adverb + adjective), then use one.
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Model use: You wrote in present but reflected in past. Write to the tense.
11.Choose three words from this lesson and build one sentence that uses all three naturally.
1.Rewrite so the meaning stays the same but you do NOT use "narrative distance": "Pick a narrative distance and hold it. Every drift has to be paid for."
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Keep the meaning of: how close the reader is standing to the character's consciousness — from ceiling-camera far to inside-the-skull close
2.Rewrite so the meaning stays the same but you do NOT use "free indirect style": "That paragraph is free indirect style — the syntax is hers, the person is his."
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Keep the meaning of: third-person narration that carries the character's voice, thought-shape and idiom without quotation marks
3.Rewrite so the meaning stays the same but you do NOT use "narrator access": "Your narrator lost access on page two and then borrowed it back on page four. Pick."
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Keep the meaning of: what the narrator is permitted to know — one mind, all minds, or none
4.Rewrite so the meaning stays the same but you do NOT use "limited third": "This is limited third — we don't get to know what he's thinking."
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Keep the meaning of: third-person narration confined to one character's consciousness
5.Rewrite so the meaning stays the same but you do NOT use "the unreliable narrator": "She's an unreliable narrator about her mother and she is completely trustworthy about the bakery."
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Keep the meaning of: a first-person or close-third voice whose account the reader is invited to distrust in a specific direction
6.Summarise the lesson's main idea in exactly 20 words — no more, no less.
1.The scene you brought (from the L40 homework's two passages).
2.Back-up: a woman calling her adult son to say her husband has died.
3.Back-up: a job candidate reading the rejection email in the office they'd expected to be hired into.
4.Long turn (2 minutes, no notes): Choose a real specific moment from your own life or from a story you have wanted to write. In 20 minutes, draft the OPENING 320 words. Fix DISTANCE, PERSON, TIME and ACCESS on purpose before you write a word. Then in 3 minutes, read it aloud to teacher, who plays a writing-workshop editor. In the last 2 minutes, teacher marks every voice leak, every un-earned interiority and every drift of distance — and you must defend or cut, live, in the room.
5.Record 90 seconds using at least four of: narrative distance, free indirect style, narrator access, limited third, to hold the distance, a voice leak, to write to the tense. Listen back and mark one thing to make more precise.
1.Plan first: write a three-line outline (position → strongest support → concession) before you draft.
2.Write a 320-word opening scene of a story you would finish (in your imagination) in the next month. At the top of the page, fix your four choices — DISTANCE, PERSON, TIME, ACCESS — in a single line each. The scene MUST hold all four across every sentence: no un-marked distance shifts, no un-earned interiority, no voice leaks, and the tense must permit only the reflection or foresight actually used. Alongside, submit a 40-word POSTSCRIPT — 'The four choices, defended' — one sentence per choice, saying why this voice for this scene. Use at least SEVEN target items naturally. (320 words + 40-word postscript). Include: narrative distance, free indirect style, narrator access, limited third, to hold the distance, to earn the interiority, a distance shift, a voice leak, to write to the tense.
3.Model analysis: compare your text with the model. What does the model do in its first and last sentences that yours doesn't?
1.Examiners at Band 5 reward candidates whose short stories 'sustain a distinctive narrative voice with control'. Fixing DISTANCE / PERSON / TIME / ACCESS on purpose before drafting is the single move that turns a mid-band story into a top-band one, because the whole 300 words will feel unified.
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Before writing a Part 2 short story: (1) pick a narrative distance and write it down; (2) pick a person; (3) pick a tense; (4) pick what your narrator is allowed to know and what they are refusing to know. Then draft with those four constraints visible. Any sentence that would violate one of the four is a voice leak — cut it in the last five minutes.
2.What NARRATIVE DISTANCE has the passage chosen — and where does it lean closer to the character?
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Limited third with a subtle free-indirect style. It leans in on 'the second time she had not bothered to tell herself anything at all', 'she was not really a girl, she was probably twenty-eight' (the character's mental correction) and 'sounding almost like a real question' (the character's own hearing of her voice). The narrator does not enter anyone else's head — that's the limitation.
3.Where does the passage USE FREE INDIRECT STYLE most clearly?
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'She was not really a girl, she was probably twenty-eight' — the correction is the character's private thought, delivered in third-person narration without quotation marks. Also: 'It came out, she thought, sounding almost like a real question.' The 'she thought' is a fig leaf; the sentence is her ear on her own voice.
4.How does the passage TIME-MARK — where is the tense doing work?
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Past-looking-back permits the final paragraph's foresight: 'later, she would find it and remember… and would, next week, do again.' The past tense permits the narrator to know the future of the walk home in a way present tense could not. The narrator uses that permission sparingly — only once, at the very end.
5.Where does the passage EARN THE INTERIORITY?
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It doesn't tell us why she keeps going to the post office. It shows us the behaviour (three times this week, no parcel), the small evasions (bringing a book), the completed transaction of a hypothetical she doesn't intend to use — and only then, at the end, does it name what she now knows: she'll do it again. The reader arrives at the interpretation slightly ahead of the sentence that permits it.
6.Where is the passage's NARRATOR ACCESS deliberately restricted?
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We are never told what she is grieving, what she is avoiding, why Argentina, or what her relationship to the girl behind the counter might once have been. The narrator has access only to the surface of her actions and to the very edge of her self-perception. That restriction is what makes the closing line — 'a hypothetical she did not intend to use' — carry the weight it does.
1.In your own words, when do you use "Narrative voice: distance · person · time · access"?
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Four moves at C2: (a) PICK THE DISTANCE — stand where you can see what only this distance can see; if you drift closer, do it on purpose and mark the move; (b) COMMIT TO THE PERSON — first, second and third are different instruments; switching mid-scene is a choice, not an accident; (c) TIME-MARK — past-looking-back permits reflection the character can't yet have; present-tense forbids it; write to your tense; (d) ACCESS — decide what your narrator is allowed to know and refuse to know the rest, even when it would be easier.
2.Complete naturally: "Pick a ______ and hold it. Every drift has to be paid for."
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narrative distance
3.Complete naturally: "That paragraph is ______ — the syntax is hers, the person is his."
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free indirect style
4.Complete naturally: "Your narrator lost access on page two and then borrowed it back on page four. Pick."
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narrator access
5.Complete naturally: "This is ______ — we don't get to know what he's thinking."
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limited third
6.Complete naturally: "She's an unreliable narrator about her mother and she is completely trustworthy about the bakery."
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the unreliable narrator
7.Two-minute retell: summarise the reading/listening from this lesson without looking at it.
8.Whose narrative voice do you most instinctively write like when you're not paying attention — and is that voice serving what you want to say?
9.Which of the four choices — distance, person, time, access — did you find hardest today to hold, and where did it slip?