Narrative Writing: Building Atmosphere and Tension

Year 6 EnglishWriting2 pages

About this worksheet

The Forgotten Greenhouse is the setting for this two-page Year 6 narrative task. Pupils push open a rusted iron door, meet creeping vines and hear a sharp rustle, then a low hum. Their job is to write the opening scene for a class anthology and hold back what is moving in the shadows. Three planning questions cover sensory details, sentence length and one line of dialogue. A bank of twelve words, from suffocating to deafening, supports the draft. It fits England National Curriculum writing composition objectives.

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Narrative Writing: Building Atmosphere and Tension: Writing - page 1
Narrative Writing: Building Atmosphere and Tension: Writing - page 2

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Curriculum objectives covered

Writing - composition

“In writing narratives, considering how authors have developed characters and settings in what pupils have read, listened to or seen performed”

The greenhouse prompt acts as a model setting that pupils continue in their own voice.

Writing - composition

“Selecting appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning”

Question 2 is about sentence length and tension, and the word bank offers choices like oppressive and plunged.

Writing - composition

“In narratives, describing settings, characters and atmosphere and integrating dialogue to convey character and advance the action”

Questions 1 and 3 plan the sensory detail and one piece of dialogue that moves the action on.

What's inside this worksheet

The Forgotten Greenhouse

A short prompt written in the second person, set at the edge of a derelict estate and ending on the strange hum through the damp floorboards.

Step 1: Plan Your Scene

Pupils choose three sensory details, plan how their sentence lengths will change as the noise gets closer, and write one whispered or shouted line.

Step 2: Vocabulary Bank

Twelve words, including stagnant, silhouette, oppressive and thrashing.

Step 3: Write Your Narrative Opening

Space for pupils to draft the opening scene before the reveal.

How teachers use it

Class anthology

Use it as the planning lesson for a class book of suspense openings.

Short burst writing

Give pupils 15 minutes on Step 3 only, with a rule that they use five words from the bank.

Modelling sentence length

Before pupils plan, read aloud a paragraph where the sentences get shorter as the hum grows. Question 2 then makes sense.

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