Six word story

Ernest Hemming was once asked to come up with a story in six words. His reply;

"Baby shoes for sale. Never used."

I thought that would be a great idea for a filler activity or as a writing warm up exercise.

Lesson plan

1 Write the Hemmingway's story on the board and the questions words;

who
what
where
when
why

2 Now explain to the students that they have to think of questions using the question words

E.g Who do the shoes belong to?
Why are they selling them?

3 Check the student's grammar and spelling then answer their questions. Try to make your answers as dramatic as possible in order to fire their imagination.

4 Now ask students to write down their own six-word story.

5 They then show their story to their partner who asks them six questions using the question words.

6 Students swap roles.


Thanks to David Muir for putting me onto the story and check out his idea for using Flickr for this activity.