Character description for 11 Plus writing

It struck me today while reading one of the texts set for a CSSE paper last year that it included a fantastic ‘Show, Don’t Tell’ passage about a character.

It’s often hard to explain to children how to write succinct and compelling character descriptions, so showing what a ‘good one’ looks like can help.

Here’s the extract from The Good Companions, a novel by the English author J.B. Priestly (written in 1929).

Mr Tarvin = the headteacher

Everybody was there, but only Mr Tarvin was making an effort to talk. He was a spectacled pompous little man, with an unusual and quite misleading expanse of forehead and a large and shaggy moustache that had been trained to hide what would undoubtedly be a weak mouth. He had a habit of punctuating his speech with a curious explosive sound …

What does each description tell us?
1. Mr Tarvin was making an effort to talk = suggests he wasn’t naturally chatty.
2. spectacled pompous little man = gives two appearance details, plus a personality detail.
3. unusual and quite misleading expanse of forehead = humour might suggest that he’s not as intelligent as he looks?
4. a large and shaggy moustache that had been trained to hide what would undoubtedly be a weak mouth = an appearance detail to show his careless attention to personal grooming, plus a suggestion about his personality by the shape of his mouth.
5. He had a habit of punctuating his speech with a curious explosive sound … = using the sense of ‘sound’, we can imagine his unappealing voice and its delivery.

Are you up for a short writing challenge?
Have a go at describing the equally excellent and foul Miss Trunchbull, the fictional headmistress of Crunchem Hall Primary School from Roald Dahl’s 1988 novel, Matilda.

Here are some facts about ‘The Trunchbull’ to get you started:
· Name: Agatha Trunchbull, also known as Miss Trunchbull or simply The Trunchbull.
· Looks more like a somewhat eccentric and bloodthirsty follower of the stag-hounds than the headmistress of a nice school for children.
· A fierce tyrannical monster.
· She frightens the life out of pupils and teachers alike.
· She’s notorious for her brutal and wildly idiosyncratic discipline (for trivial misdeeds, including simply wearing pigtails!).
· She’s very superstitious and has an intense fear of ghosts, black cats and the supernatural.
· Miss Trunchbull was a past shot putter, hammer, and javelin thrower in the Munich Olympics.
· She often throws children and uses a crop to scare children as punishment, which usually ends in accidents or injuries.

Have fun with your description! It’s not every day you get the power to describe a teacher just as you’d like!
Anna