Worksheet 1 - Personal Narrative: Topic Brainstorm
Name:
Directions: Choose three (3) different topics, and in the column under each topic freely brainstorm your memories, feelings and
experiences. For example: "Topic #1: Holidays spent with my family, cooking food together, the kitchen is always crowded, Dad making his
"famous" stuffing, the time we had Thanksgiving at my sister’s house and everything went wrong".
Possible topics: Holidays, Family, Friends, Food with new people or strangers, Traveling/vacations, Special events or occasions, traditions, cooking
together, food disasters, unusual food experiences, food experiments, food successes, “American” food, “non-American” food
Topic #1:
Topic #2:
Topic #3:
Worksheet 2 - Personal Narrative: Sub-Topic Web
Directions: You will create a Sub-topic which will be the subject of your personal narrative. A sub-topic is specific and may be a combination of two or more
related topics from the first worksheet. For example, Professor Petro wrote a lot about both topics “Family” and “Holidays”, specifically about Thanksgiving
holidays with her family. So, Professor Petro’s sub-topic is “Thanksgivings with my family.” Write your sub-topic in the center of your web. From there,
brainstorm in more detail memories, feelings, and experiences related to your sub-topic. You can connect related ideas with lines if it helps you to organize ideas
(like a spider web’s connected lines). Your sub-topic web will be used to generate your outline for your personal narrative.
Worksheet 3 – Personal Narrative: Focus Statement and Topic Outline
Directions: You will be writing a focus statement for your personal narrative. This is the statement that will capture your topic for the reader,
and it will help you guide your writing. For example, Professor Petro’s focus statement may be: The year we had Thanksgiving in Delaware at my
sister’s house was a small blow to the usual happy traditions of golden turkey and Dad’s famous stuffing. From this statement, the reader knows
they will be reading a story about my experience one Thanksgiving at my sister’s house. The focus statement also helps set the mood; from this
statement you can guess it wasn’t the happiest holiday I have had.
Write your focus statement:
We will be using the format for “Topic Outline”. Using your brainstorm web in Worksheet #2, write an outline for your personal narrative.
Remember that you are telling a story, so your outline should be chronological and have a beginning, middle and end. Here is Professor Petro’s
example:
Topic: The Thanksgiving in Delaware that went completely wrong
I.
Beginning – I arrive from New York City to my sister’s house the day before Thanksgiving
a. This Thanksgiving is small – only me, my parents, sister, Teresa, and her fiancé Anthony
a. Normally the holiday is much larger because we celebrate with extended family
b. My sister has to work this year, so we are visiting her so she won’t miss the holiday
b. My sister lives in Delaware
a. She moved there with her fiancé, Anthony
b. She hates Delaware and hates her job at a department store in the mall
c. At this point, I don’t know Anthony very well
c. It’s really dreary, cold weather when I arrive
II. Middle – Thanksgiving Day we start preparing the meal
a. Dad is busy and happy making his famous stuffing and the turkey
a. You know he’s happy because he’s whistling
b. Or he could be annoyed because his whistling can mean either
b. Everyone else is assigned a dish to make
a. Teresa’s job is to make dessert
1.
Her choice was chocolate pudding pie
2. All that this involves is a store-bought pie crust and some instant pudding
b. Anthony’s job is to make the sweet potatoes
1. This involved boiling the sweet potatoes until they are soft then mashing them
c. My mom and I make some of the other smaller side dishes
1. I don’t remember at all what she and I made, probably because at this point, the tides turn
c. Everything goes wrong
a. Anthony announces that he has a headache and disappears to the back room to play heavy metal on his guitar. He had
seemed a little stressed out while putting the potatoes on
b. He abandons the sweet potatoes for a long time and they keep boiling until the water evaporates and they start to shrivel
up
1. Teresa gets upset that Anthony has disappeared
2. I’m annoyed that Anthony disappeared
3. My parents are ignoring the fact that he disappeared
c. I’m not so sure my dad and Anthony like each other
1. The whistling might mean they have tension and no one wants to talk about it
2. My mom and Anthony always get along great and laugh like hyenas together over nothing that I understand
d. Teresa is so upset she burns the pie crust
a. It’s burnt around the edges. She plops the pudding in the middle. It looks unappealing
b. Teresa takes over the shriveled potatoes and mashes them
III. End - We sit down to eat at my sister’s small table.
a. Anthony comes to the table for dinner
a. I feel extremely awkward
b. Teresa suddenly bursts into tears because she’s upset that she has to work at the department store at 5:00 am the next
morning
1. We try to make her feel better
2.
I don’t remember tasting the food at all
3. By the time the deformed pudding pie comes out, at least we can laugh at it
b. Still dark the next morning, I hear my sister looking for her coffee mug and getting ready for work