Reading and writing : Narrate using biographical information about outstanding figures

🔊 La maîtresse lit pour toi

Think of someone you admire — someone who is not a footballer and not a singer. Now try to say why, out loud, in thirty seconds. You will probably say “he was great” or “she did a lot for the country”, and then stop. That is the difficulty: admiration is easy to feel and hard to write. What does a good text about a person actually contain?

🎓في نهاية هذا الدرس ستكون قادرا على:

قراءة نصّ عن شخصيّة بارزة واستخراج الأسباب التي تجعل الكاتب معجبا بها
تحديد الروابط التي ترتّب الأسباب : ⁦First · Second · Third · Finally⁩
تفادي التكرار باستعمال المرادفات والضمائر
كتابة سيرة قصيرة لشخصيّة جزائريّة بارزة : من ؟ متى ؟ ماذا فعل ؟ ولماذا نتذكّره ؟

🔑يفترض هذا الدرس أنّك تتقن:

الماضي البسيط في الإثبات والنفي، فهو زمن السيرة
النعوت التي تصف الشخصيّة : ⁦brave · modest · generous⁩
قراءة نصّ والبحث فيه عن معلومة دقيقة دون قراءته كلمة كلمة

Read

اقرأ النصّ مرّة قراءةً سريعة لتعرف موضوعه، ثمّ قراءةً ثانية متأنّية للتفاصيل.

Read the text once quickly, just to find out who it is about. Then read it a second time, slowly, with a pencil: underline the four link words that open the four reasons. Only then open the questions.

Martin Luther King Day

Martin Luther King Junior never starred in a Hollywood film, and he never killed “the bad guys”, but he was my hero. There are four reasons why. First, he was a man of peace. He never preached violence against those white people who hated the black population in America. Second, he was very courageous. He knew that there were racists who wanted to kill him, but he was not afraid of them. Third, he was a man who defended the rights of workers for a decent salary and those of children for a good education. Finally, his defence of Civil Rights in a peaceful way won him the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1964. After this he became well-known, but he remained very modest in everything. The Americans are right to celebrate Martin Luther King Day, because he spent his whole life teaching us lessons of love, peace, tolerance, justice, self-respect and respect for other people. He lived and died for us. So we should remember him at least once a year.

Skimming — the general idea

القراءة السريعة : الفكرة العامّة.

What is the text about? Who wrote it, and to say what?

عمّ يتحدّث النصّ ؟ ومن كتبه ؟ ولأيّ غرض ؟

The text is about Martin Luther King Junior, and it is written by someone who calls him “my hero”. Its purpose is not to tell his life story from beginning to end. It is to justify an admiration — and the writer says so in his second sentence: “There are four reasons why.” After that sentence come the four reasons, one paragraph each — and a last paragraph that concludes. ⟹ Read that second sentence again. It is the thesis of the text, and it also announces the plan. A whole paragraph of work is done in five words.

Scanning — the details

القراءة الباحثة : التفاصيل. ابحث عن الجواب في النصّ، لا في ذاكرتك.

1. Who was M. L. King? 2. Was he modest? 3. Did he kill anyone? 4. When did he win the Nobel Prize? 5. Why do Americans celebrate his day?

أجب عن الأسئلة الخمسة انطلاقا من النصّ.

A man of peace and a defender of Civil Rights — of the rights of workers and of children.
Yes. “He became well-known, but he remained very modest in everything.”
No — “he never killed the bad guys”, and “he never preached violence”.
In 1964, for his peaceful defence of Civil Rights.
Because “he spent his whole life teaching us lessons of love, peace, tolerance, justice, self-respect and respect for other people”.

⚠️ Question 3 is the interesting one. The answer is no, and the proof is a word: never, used twice in the first sentence. ⟹ In a text about a person, the negative sentences say as much as the positive ones.

2. The four reasons — find them and say what marks them

استخرج الأسباب الأربعة، وحدّد الروابط التي ترتّبها.

Link word	The reason	The proof given
First	he was a man of peace	he never preached violence against the white people who hated the black population
Second	he was very courageous	he knew racists wanted to kill him, but he was not afraid
Third	he defended people's rights	the rights of workers to a decent salary, of children to a good education
Finally	he was recognised for it	the Nobel Prize for Peace, and he stayed modest afterwards

⭐ Every reason comes with its proof — in the next sentence, or in the same one. That is the difference between “he was courageous” and a text that convinces: a claim, then a fact. Four times.

Avoiding repetition

تفادي التكرار : أداتان — المرادف والضمير.

Match each word with a synonym you could use instead

اربط كلّ كلمة بمرادفها.

In the text	You could also write
killed	murdered
courageous	brave
afraid	frightened
well-known	famous
remained	stayed
defended	supported

Now count how many times the writer says “Martin Luther King” in the whole text: three — at the start, in the title of the day, and nowhere else. Everywhere else he writes he, him, his. ⟹ Two tools, and you already own both: the pronoun replaces the name, the synonym replaces the word. Use them and your text stops sounding like a list.

Write — a short biography

الإنتاج : اكتب سيرة قصيرة لشخصيّة جزائريّة بارزة تعجبك.

A short biography answers four questions, in this order: Who? — the name, and what the person was (a writer, a doctor, a leader). When and where? — born, and where; died, and where. What did he or she do? — two or three facts, in the past simple. Why do we remember this person? — the reason, and it is the only sentence where you give your opinion. ⭐ Then add what you have just learnt from the text: order your reasons with “First, Second, Third, Finally”, prove each one, and avoid repeating the name.

Your task

Choose an outstanding Algerian figure that you admire — a writer, a scientist, a doctor, a sportswoman, a historical leader. Find the facts first (your teacher, the school library, your family), then write eight to ten lines answering the four questions above. ⛔ Do not write a single date or a single fact that you have not checked. A biography with an invented date is not a biography.

A model — the same method applied to the text you have just read

نموذج : المنهجيّة نفسها مطبّقة على النصّ الذي قرأته.

Write yours first. This model uses only the facts of the text above, reorganised as a biography — so that you can see the method, not copy the content.

Model

Martin Luther King Junior was an American defender of Civil Rights. He was a man of peace, and he never preached violence against the people who hated the black population of his country. First, he was courageous: he knew that racists wanted to kill him, but he was not afraid of them. Second, he defended the rights of workers to a decent salary, and the rights of children to a good education. Finally, his peaceful struggle won him the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1964. He became famous, but he stayed modest. We remember him because he spent his whole life teaching lessons of tolerance and justice. That is why the Americans celebrate a day in his name every year.

Check the model against the four questions: who (first line), what he did (the three reasons), why we remember him (the last paragraph). The fourth, when and where, is missing: the text you read gives no birth and no death, so the model cannot answer it — in your own biography, never leave it out. And check the two tools: the name appears only once — then he, him, his take over, and “courageous” became “brave”… no — look again: “well-known” became famous, and “remained” became stayed. One synonym is enough to change the music of a sentence.

At the BEM, this is one of the two or three subjects that come back most often in Written expression: “write a short paragraph about a famous person you admire”. Keep this ready: the past simple throughout (was, did, won, became) ; three ordered reasons with “First, Second, Finally” ; a proof after each reason ; and one closing sentence saying why we remember the person. ⛔ The mistake examiners see every year: a paragraph of adjectives — “he was great, brave, famous, intelligent” — with not one fact to support them.

Writing about a person is not listing qualities: it is proving them. Announce how many reasons you have, order them with link words, and give a fact after each one. Then remove the repetitions — a pronoun here, a synonym there — and end on the only sentence where you are allowed to say “I”: why this person should be remembered.

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