The 4 Ps of an Irish Story

For the Ceapdóireacht section of the Irish JC paper, you have the option of writing an article, debate or story. While your choice depends on what you've learned in class, the story option is often the easiest to adapt to all of your Irish knowledge.

Before beginning to write, think about your Prompt, Paragraphs, Plan and Phrases

Prompt

The prompt you get is more important than you might think. Sometimes they can be hard to interpret but it's usually easy to figure out what it means by looking at all of the words in the prompt that you understand. The prompt usually sets the scene and gives you a location, time of year or situation to write about. It's important to constantly keep this in mind while planning the story because you'll lose marks if your story doesn't relate to the prompt.

Sometimes the prompt is about a situation that you haven't learnt phrases for but you should never let that scare you our or stop you. You can usually filter through topics that you have studied and think about how to relate them to the prompt. Then, once you can write a basic story, keep referencing the theme of the prompt.

For example, I once had to write a scéal about an eachtra that happened on Halloween. I knew very little Halloween vocab and hadn't prepared anything but I had learned some party vocabulary and some fire vocabulary. I decided that the story would be about a fire at a Halloween party. I made sure to keep tying it back to Halloween by mentioning púcaí, taibhsí, puimpkíní and milseáin.

Paragraphs

When writing your Scéal it’s always a good idea to write a brief plan before hand. For stories, a good guideline is to keep it to 6 or maybe 7 short paragraphs.

Your first paragraph will be a little introduction and it will set the scene.

Your second paragraph should be about what was going on before the main incident took place.

Your third paragraph should be when things start to go wrong or you start to notice the problem.

Your fourth paragraph should be all about the big incident, when the situation is at its worst.

Then, your fifth paragraph should be the resolution to the problem.

Finally, your last paragraph should explain the consequences of the incident and what you learnt from it.

This outline won’t work for all scenarios, but it will work for most and it’s a good idea to keep it in mind. However, there’s room to add in a bit here or take away a bit there if needs be.

Plan

When you write out your brief plan, you should keep this guideline in mind. To write your plan, for each paragraph write down one sentence which best describes it. Then write down important phrases or words that you want to remember to use in that paragraph.

The whole plan should be completed in Irish and it shouldn’t take more than 10 minutes. Even if you aren’t a “plan person”, I suggest you do this.

Phrases

Using nice phrases and a variety of tenses is also a good idea when writing your composition. Stories are mainly in the Aimsir Chaite but try to include one sentence in the Aimsir Láithreach, Aimsir Fháistineach and Modh Coinníolach.

For example, you could say “I remember that day well”, “I will never forget what happened”, and “I would have stayed at home if I had known what would happen”.

Sample Plan

Eachtra a tharla nuair atá tú ag siopadóireacht

1. Ag ullmhú don cuairt go dtí an ionad siopadóireacht:

Smideadh, ag fáil réidh, cur mé airgid i dtaisce

2. Ag siopadóireacht:

Éadaí álainn, dubh le daoine, lamaí lán le málaí

3. Tús an tine:

Aláram tine, boladh deataigh, lasracha

4. Ag éalú amach:

Fear slandála, i bpreabadh na súl, thug me faoi deara, ba beag nar...

5. Ar ais isteach:

Mo chara gan aithne gan urlabhra, deora i mo shúla, ag béicig amach, nglór fann