Counting after closing

Text C: an original fiction extract.

When the supermarket closed, Kai expected the shelves to become easier to understand. Without customers moving things, he imagined that counting would be a matter of working steadily from left to right. The stocktake supervisor, Elena, gave him a clipboard and showed him the section of kitchen goods. He was to record the number of each item, not the number of spaces filled. Kai nodded. He had been praised for being quick during his first week and hoped the evening would provide another opportunity.

The first shelf held mugs in cardboard sleeves. Kai counted twelve visible fronts and wrote twelve. Farther along were storage jars packed in pairs. He counted the boxes and wrote nine. Behind him, Elena checked a delivery list with another worker. Kai finished the section before she returned. His figures filled their squares neatly. He enjoyed the appearance of a completed job, especially while the neighbouring worker was still lifting things down and looking behind them.

Elena asked him to count the jars again. Kai said he had already done so twice. She opened one box and placed the two jars beside it. On the sheet, the unit was one jar. His nine boxes therefore represented eighteen items. He corrected the figure. Then she lifted a mug sleeve from the front of the shelf. It was empty. The sleeve had been used to keep the display looking full. Kai crossed out twelve with enough force to mark the page beneath.

The worker beside him, Mo, brought over a mug found in a different section. Kai felt a brief surge of relief: perhaps somebody else’s untidiness explained the entire mistake. Mo said the mug had been placed among the plant pots and asked which line it belonged to. Elena asked Kai to check the product number rather than decide by colour. Two mugs on his shelf had the same blue pattern but different sizes. The number on the loose mug matched the larger version. Kai had put both sizes into one total.

For a while he worked without speaking. The shop’s quiet had become less comforting. He could hear the small sounds of Mo’s method: a box lifted, a label read aloud, an item returned to its place. Mo said that he counted uncertain shelves on a separate scrap before entering the final figure. It made corrections less annoying. Kai looked at his deeply crossed-out sheet and accepted the scrap of paper offered to him.

They rechecked the section together. Kai read the item and unit while Mo counted, then they changed roles. Behind a row of small bowls they found another row which could not be seen from the aisle. At the end, Elena asked Kai what should be explained differently to the next new worker. He suggested showing an empty display sleeve and a paired box before handing over the clipboard. Then he added that a neat answer could still be the answer to the wrong question. Elena asked him to write that point down too. He did, more slowly than he had written the first twelve.

You are Kai. Write a report for Elena about your first stocktake section, explaining the difficulties and recommending improvements for new workers.

In your response:

• explain your original approach and why it produced errors
• explain how Elena and Mo helped you improve your work
• recommend what future new workers should be shown and how they should check their counts

Base your response on Text C, developing its ideas in your own words. Write about 250 to 300 words. Up to 10 marks are available for reading and up to 10 marks for writing.