Writing a Personal
Narrative
NOTES IN LINK
NARRATIVE WRITING
STEP BY STEP
• Writing a story is like cooking food.
First, you gather primary ingredients
and prepare them according to a
basic recipe. As you go along, you
season your story with “spices” such
as effective dialogue, colorful
descriptions, and thoughtful
explanations.
THE PLOT
• The plot is the main ingredient in any
story. It refers to all of the action—
the events that move a story along
from start to finish. A plot has five
basic parts: exposition, rising action,
climax, falling action, and resolution.
The plot line that follows shows how
these parts all work together.
EXPOSITION
The exposition is the beginning part of a story in which the
characters, setting, and conflict are usually introduced. There is
at least one main character in all stories and, almost always, one
or more supporting or secondary characters. The setting is where
the story takes place, and the conflict is the main problem that
really gets the action under way.
•
Tracy Jones is a 13-year-old girl who lives in
Houston, Texas. She is having trouble seeing things at a
distance, but she doesn’t want to wear glasses. She is
afraid that people will make fun of her, especially at school.
•
RISING ACTION
•
In the rising action, the main character tries to solve his or her problem.
The main character should be involved in at least two or three important
actions because of the problem. This builds suspense into the story.
• First Action: Tracy goes to a movie with her mother,
who asks why she squints to see the screen. Tracy says
that she is just thinking hard about the film.
•
• Second Action: Later, her parents learn that she has
trouble seeing the board in class. Tracy says the
classroom lights are too bright.
•
• Third Action: Her parents insist that Tracy see an eye
doctor. That night, Tracy dreams she is in class wearing
big magnifying lenses.
•
•
•
The climax is the most exciting or important part in a story. At this
point, the main character comes face-to-face with his or her problem. (All
of the action leads up to the climax.) This part is sometimes called the
turning point.
The eye doctor says Tracy does need glasses. When they arrive a
few days later, she dreads wearing them to school. While she is
teased by a few kids, her close friends actually like her new look.
FALLING ACTION
•
In this part, the main character learns to deal with life “after
the climax.” Perhaps, he or she makes a new discovery about life
or comes to understand things a little better.
• Tracy learns that one of her friends has had
glasses for weeks but was too shy to wear
them. The two girls joke about starting a
“spectacles” club. She also discovers that
no one really pays much attention to her
glasses when she wears them in class.
•
The resolution, or denouement, brings a story to a natural,
surprising, or thought-provoking conclusion. (The falling act ion
and the resolution often are very closely related.)
•
Tracy asks if she and her mom
could go to another movie, and
she promises to wear her
glasses.
SO…WHAT IS A
NARRATIVE
AND HOW DO I
DO ONE?
OPEN LINK SPIRAL
Personal Narratives (link)
• A personal narrative re-creates a
specific experience or event in your
life.
• To write an effective narrative, select
an experience that you feel strongly
about.
Be Selective with Details
• Although you are telling a story, you will
still be using sensory details to paint a
mental picture for your readers.
• It is important to include specific details.
• However, a reader doesn’t need to know
every little thing.
• Select details that are important to
retelling the story.
Writing a Narrative
Paragraph (link)
A narrative paragraph has 3 parts:
1. The Introduction and the topic
sentence – The Beginning
2. The Body or The Middle – share
details that re-create the experience
3. The End or closing – reflects on the
experience
THE BEGINNING
– Introduces the subject
• Start with a “hook”
– Start with the word Imagine
» Imagine, entering a dark and spooky place all by
yourself.
– Start with a sound.
» Creak! The door began to open.
– Start in the middle of the action.
» Suddenly, I heard a loud crash come from the inside
of the cave.
– Start with a surprising statement.
» When I was three, I decided to crawl through the dog
door to play in the snow. The only problem was that
the temperature outside was three degrees below zero
and I was dressed only in my pajamas.
MORE WAYS TO BEGIN
– Start with the character talking.
» “His lips were swollen as he glared at me and
said, “I …will… get… you… for… this!”
– Start with important background
information.
» Mr. Brown was in the Marines before he
became my teacher and my coach. He didn’t
allow any fooling around in class.
– Start at the end…then flash back to the
story.
» I sat there on the sofa with a cast on my leg
and wondered how I got there.
THE MIDDLE
– Tells the Story
– Include some dialogue (not too much!)
– Include important details (Who, What,
When, Where, Why, How)
– Explain, examples, proof, DETAILS!
– Always tell feelings about the story
– USE ACTION VERBS! (sizzled, crashed,
taped, slammed, blared, gobbled, banging,
sliding, blasting, glistening, challenge,
frighten, terrorized, embarrass, peering
etc…)
THE END
• THE END
– TELL THE ENDING
– TELL HOW YOU CHANGED
Your Goals for Writing a
Personal Narrative
• Ideas – clear ideas that re-create life
experiences
• Organization – retell the story in
chronological order with a strong beginning,
middle, and end
• Voice – you want to sound natural,
believable, and interested in your own topic
(try to use dialogue when possible)
Your Goals for Writing a
Personal Narrative (continued)
• Word Choice – choose appropriate words
based on their connotations
• Sentence Fluency – make each sentence
move smoothly into the next
• Conventions – correct any spelling,
punctuation, capitalization, and grammar
errors before turning in your final draft (use
a dictionary, spell check, and grammar
handbook)
STEP 1
• CREATE YOUR CHARACTERS- WHO
WAS INVOLVED?
• CREATE YOUR SETTING- WHERE DID
IT ALL TAKE PLACE?
• Form a Conflict- WHAT WAS THE
“PROBLEM” OF THE STORY
STEP 2
• Think About the Action
What could
your main character do about the problem?
Try to list two or three of these actions. Also,
consider the climax or turning point in the
story.
•
Consider an Ending Decide how you
want your story to end. Make sure that your
ending is believable within the context of your
story.
ASSESSMENT #1
PG.30
• Writing a Narrative About an
Incident That Changed Me
•
•
SUGGESTED LEARNING STRATEGIES: Prewriting, Drafting,
Revising, Self-Editing, Peer Editing
Assignment
• Your assignment is to write a personal
narrative about an incident that brought
about change in your life.
PREWRITING
• 1. Revisit your prior work in this unit, looking
especially at significant incidents that brought
change to your life. List these incidents and
indicate how each changed you.
• 2. Share your list with a classmate, and work
together to choose an incident that changed you
in a significant way. Be sure the incident meets
the following criteria:
– is interesting to a reader
– has a clear beginning, middle, and end
– had an effect on you in a significant way
NEXT…
• 3. List the specific events that
make up the incident.
• Organize the sequence of events
for your narrative by creating a
Memory Map or a story map AND a
plot line diagram.
NEXT…
4. As you create your new Memory Map, use the following pointers to help
you organize your thoughts.
Include the setting – the time and place where the incident
occurred— and the situation. Who was involved? What was your life
like before the incident? What was the incident?
Describe the beginning of the incident. How did the incident
start? What were you doing, thinking, and feeling? Who else was
there? What were they doing and saying?
Continue describing the sequence of events in the middle of the
incident. Include important details so that the reader can experience
this incident with you.
Explain how the incident ended. Describe how the incident
changed you. What is your life like now compared to what it was like
before the incident?
Reflect on the incident. What did you learn or discover or realize
from this incident? How did it change you? What are the future
implications of this incident? What do you now know that you didn’t
know before?
LET’S START PLANNING
PLOT MAP
Use the revising
checklist to check
your progress.
Revising the Personal
Narrative
• Your first draft is your first look at a
developing narrative. During the revising
step, you improve your first draft by
adding to, rewriting, or reorganizing
different parts.
• Focus on these traits when you revise:
–
–
–
–
–
Ideas
Organization
Voice
Word Choice
Sentence Fluency
Keys to Effective Revising
1.
Set aside your first draft for a day or two, if possible,
before you review your writing.
2.
Be sure each main part—the beginning, the middle,
and the ending—works well.
3.
Revise any parts that seem confusing or incomplete.
4.
Pay special attention to your writing voice. Do you
sound truly interested in the experience?
5.
Use specific words that reflect your feelings about the
experience.
6.
Be sure your sentences read smoothly.
Revising for Ideas
• Be sure your narrative “shows” your experience,
not just “tells” it.
• Details make the narrative clear.
• Do I show rather than tell in my narrative?
– Your narrative shows if sentences contain action,
sensory details, dialogue, and your personal
thoughts and feelings.
• Have I included enough details?
– Use the 5 W’s and H — who? what? when? where? why?
and how?
Revising for Organization,
• Be sure all parts of your narrative
work smoothly together.
• Does my beginning grab the
reader’s attention?
– It does if it does one of the following:
1. Starts in the middle of the action.
2. Creates a clear image with sensory details.
3. Opens with a personal thought.
Revising for Organization,
• Does my ending work well?
– It does if you can answer “yes” to these 4
questions:
1.Does my essay build to my personal victory or
accomplishment?
2.Does my personal narrative end soon after the most
intense or most important moment?
3.Will my reader know why this event is important to
me?
4.Are all my reader’s questions answered?
– If any answer is “no”, revise your ending to
make it more solid and satisfying.
Revising for Voice
• The key is realism and consistency.
• Does my dialogue sound realistic?
– It is if it reveals the speaker’s personality.
– Do you know what your speaker’s personality
is? (see the chart on p. 112)
• Have I created a consistent narrative
voice?
– Does it sound like you throughout the entire
work?
Revising for Word Choice
• Use specific verbs and words with the
right connotation, or feeling.
• Have I used specific verbs?
– You have if your verbs show clear actions.
– Use the chart on p. 114 to improve your piece.
• Do my verbs have the right
connotation?
– They do if they create the feeling you want.
– Notice the difference in meaning of the verbs
in the chart on p. 115.
Revising for Sentence
Fluency
• Check for a variety of short and long
sentences.
• When should I use long sentences?
– To express complex ideas.
• When should I use short sentences?
– To deliver especially important ideas.
– A series of short sentences can quicken the
pace like a heart beating faster.