Personal Narrative Key traits: Ideas Focuses on a single experience

1. Personal Narrative • Key traits: • Ideas • Focuses on a single experience • Uses dialogue to re-create the experience • Organization • Has an attention-getting introduction • Uses transitions to make the order of events clear • Shows the importance of the experience in the conclusion • Voice • Shows the writer’s individual style

2. Word Choice • Uses descriptive language to make the experience come alive for the reader • Sentence Fluency • Uses a variety of sentence types (statements, questions, and exclamations) • Conventions • Uses correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation

3. Create a Timeline • http://learnzillion.com/lessons/1829-create-a-timeline-of-an-important-event-in-your-life • List the events of your story along a time line. • Eliminate parts of the story that are not important to the story. • Add in parts that may be missing that are important by writing in events on the time line, and use them to create your draft.

4. Introduction • There are may ways to grab readers’ attention in the introduction. • Dialogue: “I can’t breathe,” I choked out. • Sensory details: Branches hanging from low trees scratched my face as I forced my way through the jungle undergrowth. • Cliffhanger sentence: The guide screamed at me to stop, but it was too late. • Famous quotation: “It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.”

5. Use Detailed Description http://learnzillion.com/lessons/1830-use-detailed-descriptions-in-personal-narrative Review the draft that you created with your time line. Stop each time you see a place where description is missing. Weave in your sensory descriptions by asking, “What did I see, hear, smell, touch, or feel in that moment?”

6. Descriptive Language • Without descriptive words and phrases, the writer’s sentence would be bland and uninteresting. • For example, I saw buildings, sidewalks, and children. BORING!!!!! • The dog looked mean. (The dog snapped his jaws and growled through barred teeth.) • The lawn was in good shape. (Not one weed marred the green velvet surface of the lawn.) • We took a lot to eat. (We packed dewy grapes, sandwiches stuffed with tuna, and gooey chocolate brownies for our picnic.)

7. Writing Narratives that “show” instead of “tell” http://learnzillion.com/lessons/1831-writing-narratives-that-show-instead-of-tell Reread the draft that you created with your time line. Replay that part of the story in your mind and think about how you can describe this part without “telling.” Cross out the “telling” part and put in the “showing” writing.

8. Dialogue While a personal narrative is based on real events, most writers will not recall the exact words people said. Writers of personal narratives need to create dialogue that captures the spirit of what happened. Writers should avoid extra words, phrases, and sentences that do not help readers understand the action or the people involved. “I am going to need you to pass me the machete. You should probably try to find it now!” I screamed frantically. (Pass me the machete. Now!” I screamed frantically.)

9. Crafting Personal Narratives that reveal something about yourself http://learnzillion.com/lessons/1832-crafting-personal-narratives-that-reveal-something-about-yourself Reread your draft and ask yourself, “How did this experience change me? Do I act or think differently because of it? How?” Revise your draft to reveal something about yourself from this experience: “show.” don’t tell.

10. Conclusion Why was this experience important to you? Did it teach you a lesson? Did it reveal something about you or someone else? Did it shape your future in some way? If you cannot answer yes to at least one of these questions….you may have the wrong topic.  Let the reader know how the experience affected you.

11. Revise a Personal Narrative for clarity http://learnzillion.com/lessons/1833-revise-a-personal-narrative-for-clarity Read the text out loud. Highlight the parts of the story that jump to another place or time. Insert new writing that closes the gap using words like “later,” “next,” “after.”