Lesson 8 — Activity 3: Creating a Plot to Tell a Story

As you know from our study of plot so far, most stories follow a logical order of events, with a beginning, middle, and end. In this activity, you will use what you know about plot to create an outline for a short story of your own.

When we read stories, one of the elements that keeps us interested is the conflict or problem in the story. There are different types of conflict. 

The short story you read in Activity 2, "The Sniper," dealt with each of these types of conflict. Part of the conflict or problem that faced the sniper had to do with the setting of the story because it took place in a country involved in a civil war. The environment the sniper was in — the rooftop setting — made it difficult for him to escape the people who wanted to shoot him. The sniper also had to deal with the problem posed by the other characters in the story because he had the opposing fighters and the informer to deal with. Finally, at the end of the story, the sniper was faced with likely the most difficult problem of all: realizing that he had shot his own brother. This would be an internal conflict because he would have to deal with the guilt of having killed his own brother.

We also know that we will find a story more interesting if there is some suspense. If we know that the story is going to have a happy ending and we know exactly how the plot will get to the happy ending, we might not be very interested in the story. That is why authors include some twists and turns in their stories to keep our interest. There will be difficulties or obstacles placed in the way of the main character so that we want to keep reading to find out if and how the obstacles are overcome.

Digging Deeper!

Click on the Play button below to watch a video about the different types of conflict.