A New Model for Teaching Narrative Writing

Jon Weldon, Concept Schools Director of English Education

Why teach narrative writing?

Every student has a story to tell; we all have stories

Become better readers Easy to transfer the skills to other types of

writing; beginning point for other writing Concept Writing Contest!!!

Students need the how, not the what…

…Strategies

…and activities

Parts of Writing:

1. Getting Started

2. Details and Figurative Language

3. Creating Dialogue

4. Feelings and Sensations1. Smell, Touch, Sound

5. People and Action

6. Scenes and Settings

1. Getting Started: Where are your students?

Pretest with a simple prompta. Write a story about an event that is important to

you for some reason. Write about it in as much detail as you can so that someone reading it will be able to see what you saw and feel what you felt.

Collect and rate for groups Save to combine with post-test

Model – Show an example

Richard Wright piece Discuss and dramatize it Outline the events

What initiates the action?What is the character trying to do?What are the results of the action and attempts?

Examine specific details

Getting Story Ideas

1. Read the model story.2. Share!3. Show them the 8 questions.4. Have them brainstorm their own ideas.5. In groups, each student shares best two

ideas.1. Students give feedback on best idea.2. Students ask pointed questions.

My stories

the time I got in trouble in preschool for peeing in the corner of the playground

the summer I had athlete’s foot so bad that I could not swim, wear shoes, or stand up too long

the time I snuck out of my friend’s house. We had to push his car down the road so his parents wouldn’t hear him start it and drove to the next town to go to a warehouse rave.

When I set the state record for the mile in high school. During my two years living in Oakland when I saw a

“rockabilly” fight in a warehouse

1. What experiences have made you feel really happy or very sad?

2. What experiences have been very alarming or really frightening?

3. What experiences have made you feel proud of yourself?

4. What have been the most difficult tasks you have had to undertake?

5. What contests or games have you tried hard to win?

6. What experiences have made you feel ashamed of yourself?

7. What experiences have made you realize that you truly care about someone?

8. What experiences have made you laugh?

What needs to be explained about setting?

What do we need to know about characters?

What initiates or begins the action?

What does main character attempt to do?

What are the results?

How does the character respond?

What do characters say to each other?

Questions to ask

2. Details and Figurative Language

The Seashell Game

Object of the game: Describe a shell so well that another student would be able to pick it out from a class set of shells.

This game is about incorporating detail

1. Model one especially impressive shell.

2. Write responses on board as a class

3. Seashell Game1. Give each person (group) two shells. Tell them to

choose one and describe it as best they can.

4. Pass the description and shells to another person (group).

1. They must choose which one the other wrote about.

5. The second “reader” underlines the details that helped him/her identify the shell.

1. Note best details.

Frame the Description – The Paragraph

1. (write out the notes in a paragraph)

2. Hand out yesterday’s notes

3. Discuss opening and closing statements. Use only one word to describe the shell. Encourage variety in sentence structure.

4. Write it in paragraph form as a class. Grammar Time!

5. In groups, they revise their particular shell.

6. Share.

On Their Own

Students select their own shell and write a descriptive paragraph about it.

Another student finds it among all 30-40 shells based on the description.

Create a class display or museum.

Things to keep in mind:

Need 6 to 8 pairs of similar shells but different in species

For group work, shells should be more than 2 inches long

Avoid colors like green and purple, that are uncommon among shells

Resources for shells: www.shellworld.com www.seashellcity.com

Seashell Game Reflections Compare their 1st and 2nd paragraphs Effective learning begins with a concrete experience Develop criteria for judging the work in order to assess

your teaching Focus on the procedural knowledge (process)

Observations paragraph revision

Teacher Group Individual Use activities that allow students to interpret data

(details, opening) themselves

3. Creating Dialogue

I go you be trippin

He goes na you shouldn’a said that

I’m like you better get outta my face

And then he goes I’m through wit you and walks off

I started yellin like I’m gonna tell everyone what you did

Introduce the concept1. With Wright piece, ask students to underline every

place a character says something.2. Have a short discussion about the dialogue.

Consider the story without dialogue.

3. Give a scenario and create dialogue as a class. Characters Stage directions, as a play Model how to on the board

4. Distribute scenario sheets and create dialogue in groups.

Each member copies down the dialogue.

5. Collect copies to assess

6. Give short lesson on writing needs7. Use previous class dialogue as model

Grammar Time!

8. Example: Review stage and actor directions.9. Scaffolding sentence structure.

She enters. She enters on tiptoe, sneaking up to David like she’s about to strangle him.

10. Practice lesson in groups with previous dialogue11. Practice dialogue12. Act out the dialogue.

Strong readers go first.

From Scripts to Narratives

1. Distribute dialogue and discuss how this could be made into a story.

2. Distribute rules for punctuation and read over them.

3. Create the narrative dialogue as a class Keep it present tense Encourage analogies for characters’ speech Encourage creative comparisons: animal sounds

4. Complete the rest of the narrative independently.

Working Independently

1. Students choose a story idea with dialogue and write it first as a script. Correct the script dialogues; focused Have students read theirs and get feedback Discuss how it can be changed to a narrative

2. Write dialogues as narratives Focus on building out sentences

Example: From “She says” to “Tipping her head to the side and squinting her eye, she says”

4. Sensations – Describing Sounds

Perhaps the best example of sound in a passage is Poe’s “A Tell-Tale Heart”. Provide a copy to the students and ask them to find all the descriptions of sound.

Create a list of the sounds. Develop a sound script – a list of sounds and when they

are used in the story, as if it was a movie. Students can be assigned sounds to bring in. Or, you can find

them at www.freesound.org Each student is responsible for at least one sound.

Write the sound directions in the margins by the appropriate places.

Describing Sounds

Indicate the source of the sound. Use words that imitate the sound. Break complicated sounds into parts. Describe the character and texture of the

sound. Comparisons – Use figurative language or

analogies to describe the sound.

Automatic dishwasher

Automatic ice-cube maker

Someone taking a shower

Basketball player playing alone in a gym

Gas-powered lawn mower

Late-night sounds near your house

Screen door slamming

Sawing a plank in half

18-wheeler truck

A sound of your choice

(The sound of silence)

Crossing Senses

Color Relay Game1. Get color swatches from the paint store.

1. http://www.hessler.com/PANTONE%28R%29%20color%20bridge%28TM%29%20CMYK%20PC%20copy.pdf

2. Write a color on the board – ie “orange” – and have all the students think of synonyms for that color. Examples: burnt orange, neon orange, basketball orange, tiger orange

2. Independent (HW) work. Choose two other colors and list 9-10 synonyms of that color.

Do not include generic terms, like light, dark etc

3. Color Relay Game – Students have to find as many synonyms as possible for each color.

set up stations with swatches of a particular color. In groups of 3 or 4, they travel to each station, making lists of

their color synonyms.

5. Writing About People

1. Begin by showing a characterization of someone.

2. Discuss. What do you see? What does this say about the person?

What other details do you notice? What about his face? What do you think he thinks of other people?

Writing About People

A Voluptuary under the horrors of Digestion

3. Group Work What do all these details suggest about the habits

of this man? How would you describe his character? What would it be like to visit this man? How would

he treat you?

4. Individual Work Imagine you have gone to visit the Prince of

Wales. Write a letter to one of your friends about the experience. How did he behave? Be specific. Include thoughts and sensations. Include dialogue.

5. Final Assignment – Writing about a person in your story

6. Describing Scenes and Settings

The Massacre of the Innocents, Peter Brueghel

1. Have students describe a part of this scene.

2. List responses.

3. An excellent moment for combining sentences.

4. Provide a model scene in a story.Example: Richard Wright excerpt What senses does he appeal to? What comparisons does he make? Overall, what do you think he thought about this

time in his life? What is your feeling after reading this?

5. Students choose their own event they remember with great pleasure and write a series of images about it.

6. In groups they share. How do you think the writer wants you to feel? What details are most effective? What parts are not clear? What questions could the writer answer with more

detail?

Conclusion1. Write a narrative using one of the following prompts:

The monster under the bed… The monster with a bad cold… The monster with a silly hat… The monster who wouldn’t brush his teeth… The monster and the sticky chewing gum…

2. Write a fictional narrative using the follow prompt: The Big Old House: What Secrets does it Hold?

3. Write a narrative using one of the following prompt: And here I stand… the last warrior. And here I stand… the lone survivor. And here I stand… exhausted but safe. And here I stand… proud to be an American. And here I stand… happy to be alive.