The teacher gives each student one of three openings, split evenly across the class: H. G. Wells's The Red Room, which starts mid-conversation, W. W. Jacobs's The Monkey's Paw, which opens slowly on a cold, wet night in a firelit parlour, and the fireside frame narrative that opens Henry James's novella The Turn of the Screw. Each student identifies two structural choices the writer made and the effect of each on the reader, and posts them as notes in the Padlet column for their opening. Students then read two posts in another column and add a comment where they would label the choice differently. The teacher projects the wall and leads a comparison of how each opening shapes what the reader expects to happen next.
This page is one of a growing set of PICRAT examples by cell, subject and grade. Page maintained by Andy Perryer.