Young Readers Science Fiction Stories — ISPACE Sentence Starters
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Lesson 5 · ISPACE
ISPACE — Sentence Starters
1
A Strange Transmission
⏱ 3 min
📡 Incoming Signal

Captain… we are picking up a transmission from a distant dimension. It is a piece of writing — but something is very wrong with it.

Read it carefully. Can you spot the problem?

The sparkling fireworks flew into the sky. The cowardly stars ran away. The audience cheered as bangs filled the air, and smoke came down. The dazzling colours danced.
🛰 What is the problem with this piece of writing?

Hint: look at the start of each sentence…

2
Introducing ISPACE
⏱ 3 min
🧑‍🏫 Tutor:

Good writers vary the start of their sentences.

ISPACE
The acronym ISPACE gives you six different ways to do exactly that.
I
-ing word
Running through the door…
S
Simile
Like a startled bird, she fled.
P
Preposition
Beneath the bridge, shadows stirred.
A
Adverb
Quietly, he opened the box.
C
Conjunction
Yet the door would not close.
E
-ed word
Exhausted, she collapsed.
Let's learn each one by going on an adventure…
🚀 Your Mission

You must travel to each of the ISPACE worlds, and survive, in order to win!

You have five lives. If you get to zero, you lose…

Choose your first dimension wisely.

3
The Six Worlds
⏱ 25 min
🧑‍🏫 Tutor:

Choose any unlocked world to begin. The world of -ed words is locked until you have completed the other five.

🌊
I
-ing Words
🦁
S
Similes
🌀
P
Prepositions
🐉
A
Adverbs
🎤
C
Conjunctions
🧩
E
-ed Words

🌊 World of -ing Words

You enter a world of -ing words…

It appears to be a world made almost entirely of water. Ponds, rivers, lakes, seas, oceans — there is almost no land.

💧 How many words ending in -ing can you think of to describe water?

Aim for at least four. Separate them with commas (e.g. crashing, foaming, drifting, glittering).

✍ Now write a short description of a wild sea, using at least two of your -ing words.

🦁 World of Similes

You arrive into the world of similes… and meet a huge army of animals.

This world seems to only have wild animals, with no humans in sight. They look curiously at you, and you realise you need to tell them what a human is.

Before they eat you.

To do that, you must use similes!

🤔 Can you remember what a simile is?
🐾 Match each human behaviour or feature to the animal it’s most like:

🌀 World of Prepositions

This world can’t seem to make up its mind what it is…

One moment it is a world of books… the next, a world of shells…

Suddenly, you realise: this world could be whatever you want. But the magic words are prepositions.

🤔 What is a preposition?
For example:
Below the giant mushrooms, flowers bloom.
Under the deepest seas, vast dinosaurs still swim.
Above, in the azure sky, three suns spin.
✍ Your turn! Describe an imaginary world in three sentences, each starting with a preposition (e.g. Beneath, Above, Beside, Inside, Across…).

🐉 World of Adverbs

Entering this world, you find a dragon’s cave.

Your eyes fall upon a large diamond, just under its golden claws. 💎

You want it… badly…

🎯 Match each adverb to the sentence it best opens:
🔥 Time to go! Fill the blanks with adverbs to describe your escape:
— you run from the fierce fingers of fire chasing you.
— the dragon’s roar echoed around the cave.
— you dive out of the cave and into the green forest.

🎤 World of Conjunctions

You are blinded by flashing light and deafening music.

This world appears to be a game show!

It seems you are in a competition, and you must get 75% of the questions right, or lose! The person before you lost, and it does not look fun…

Remember FANBOYS — the seven coordinating conjunctions:
For And Nor But Or Yet So
🎤 Q1. Which conjunction best fits? “I wanted to leave, ___ I was too tired.”
🎤 Q2. Which conjunction means “because” in “He hid, ___ he had broken the vase”?
🎤 Q3. Which sentence opens with a conjunction correctly for effect?
🎤 Q4. Which is NOT one of the FANBOYS conjunctions?

The audience erupts — you have won!

Then, you are surrounded by hundreds of fans… If you can escape their excitement, you can return home.

Write one short sentence describing your escape, beginning with a conjunction (e.g. And…, But…, Yet…, So…).

✍ Your escape sentence:

🧩 World of -ed Words

The last world is always the most dangerous…

A world of jigsaws. The floor is constantly moving, changing, falling apart…

Here we need to use all of our skills.

✍ Choose three of these -ed words and finish each sentence:
Worried Exhausted Terrified Witnessed Excited Embarrassed Alarmed Trapped Humiliated Tempted Angered

Example: Trapped talking, he tried desperately to escape the conversation.

4
The Final Challenge
⏱ 7 min
🌌 The Last Door

You have travelled through every dimension. One last test stands between you and home…

You must use every part of ISPACE to describe the picture below.

If you succeed, you can finally return home — hopefully with some lives left for another day!

🖼️
Picture placeholder — drop in any image for the student to describe (an alien landscape, a stormy sea, an abandoned city…)
✍ Use all six ISPACE sentence starters in your description:
I -ing word
S Simile (like / as)
P Preposition
A Adverb (-ly)
C Conjunction
E -ed word

As you write, the checklist above lights up when you use each starter type. Try to tick all six!

5
Home Again
⏱ 1 min
🌌

Mission Complete!

📡 Transmission Received

You have walked through six dimensions and bent each one with the power of ISPACE.

From now on, every sentence you write can begin in a new way. Variety is yours.

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Score
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Lives
—
Time
🛠️ Review Mode — every step unlocked for testing · set REVIEW_MODE = false near the bottom of this file to disable