Imaginative Writing: Model Answer (Edexcel GCSE English Language)

Gently, tentatively, I flexed my muscles, tendrils of soft light inching out further into the atmosphere [Marking comment]. Gazing down, I noticed the sand had changed from pale yellow to a warmer gold, the sparkling blue water lapping lazily over bleached-white shells. The ocean… which was it? The Atlantic, I think. [Marking comment] Chilly, I thought, even at this time of year, despite my best efforts to pierce through the burdensome clouds that so often blanketed this part of the planet. [Marking comment] But not today; today they were light, high and flimsy, streaked through with the occasional white wisp of an aeroplane trail, like the gossamer strands of a spider’s web. [Marking comment]

The petal pink of a child’s sunhat caught my attention. [Marking comment] I watched as small arms, kissed golden by my rays, meticulously [Marking comment] dug and shifted sand into two brightly-coloured buckets. As I looked more closely, it seemed as though the child was working with another — initially camouflaged by a wide-brimmed, sand-coloured hat. Ah, teamwork, I thought. [Marking comment] They have the makings of what looks like an epic sand castle there. Four towers already stood proudly defending an inner sandy courtyard, and little hands were busily digging out channels between them to create a moat. Good thinking; the tide would be turning soon.

Sighing, I lazily lifted myself higher in the sky, expanding my rays to their full potential. [Marking comment] The heat haze made it difficult to make out the activity below clearly, but I could see the beach was filling up. Rows of rectangular towels were laid out on the sand like envelopes, punctuated with tents, umbrellas, picnic boxes and bags. I could hear the laughter and shrieks from the waves, mixed with the occasional child’s cry or yell. [Marking comment] In fact, there was one persistent cry. The pink hat. Fists balled angrily, her scrunched face was directed at me, but with her eyes tightly fused shut with tears, and a face as red as my core. [Marking comment]

Camouflage hat was stomping off, having petulantly thrown his bucket into the oncoming tide. The remains of their carefully constructed sand fortress lay trampled and flat like a packet of crushed digestive biscuits. [Marking comment] Hours of painstaking work, now nothing more than a mound. The girl with the pink hat was inconsolable; all of her careful efforts wasted in a fit of childish rage. Swiftly, her mother arrived to scoop her up, kisses of comfort and “never mind”s doing little to soothe the situation. Probably time to pack up, I thought. [Marking comment]

I continued my lazy descent into the late afternoon, becoming full and orange in preparation for my setting. [Marking comment] Slowly, the crowds down below thinned out, but some groups stayed, lighting cheap disposable barbeques, the soft sounds of music wafting through the mellow evening light. A few pesky clouds had gathered to my left, but they were far enough away not to worry the magnificence of my final rays. I glanced down one final time, the cooling ocean now having consumed the last of the mounds of sand left by the children. [Marking comment] Until tomorrow.

• The response is deliberately crafted to create specific effects and to elicit a response from the reader, with sophisticated use of tone, style and register

• It has consciously used a range of structural and grammatical features to support coherence and cohesion

• Extensive vocabulary has been used strategically, with only rare spelling errors (if any) which do not detract from the overall meaning

• The writing has been punctuated deliberately and with accuracy

• A range of sentence structures is used accurately and selectively to achieve particular effects