Letters (Character Writing)

Students write a letter or email in character as someone from a novel or story the class has read, practising different registers depending on the recipient.

Procedure

1. Tell students they will write a letter as if they are a character from a novel or story the class has recently read.
2. Students write the letter as character X at the end of the story, explaining what happened and how it came about.
3. Vary the recipient to practise different registers: X writes differently to their mother, spouse, best friend, boss, headmaster, solicitor, teacher, etc.
4. Students read and compare corrected letters to appreciate differences of content and style.

Tips

• Good opportunity to review email/letter conventions: address, date, subject line, appropriate salutations
• Variation: different characters write to each other about the events they experienced (e.g. half the class writes as character A to character B, the other half as B to A). Letters are exchanged and students write replies
• Guard against AI-generated text — do this activity in class rather than as homework