11+ English
Story and descriptive writing tasks — planning, vocabulary, structure and control under timed conditions.
Creative Writing appears in 140 of our 338 ready papers (295 tagged questions). It averages 2.1 questions a paper worth about 27.18 marks each. The typical question allows around 29.2 min. It appears in 3 CSSE papers we hold.
Creative writing papers reward clear planning as much as sparkly vocabulary. Schools ask for stories, continuations or descriptions with a tight time limit. Children who dive in without a beginning–middle–end plan run out of time or trail off. Teach a two-minute plan: character, setting, problem, resolution — then write with controlled paragraphs and accurate sentences. Vocabulary should serve the plot, not decorate randomly. Practise finishing on time with a short proofread for capitals, full stops and tense consistency — those basics often separate similar scripts. If the prompt gives a picture or opening line, use it deliberately in the first paragraph so the response feels purposeful from the start.
A real tagged question from our catalogue — method included, not paywalled.
Ranked from our tagged catalogue — open a paper to practise the questions that actually test this topic.
Not sure whether creative writing is the problem? Mark any past paper on 11plusSolved and the report tells you which topics are costing marks — and how many.
