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Personal
Narratives ~ Lesson Ideas
Here
are some lesson ideas to support your creativity as a teacher.
You, of course, know your own class's learning styles, needs
and interests better than anyone, so please use what is helpful
and modify or disregard the rest. Depending on your teaching
style and your students' pace of learning, each lesson step
could last one or several days. In "Download
Options" you can find a downloadable version of this
unit and sample student handouts.
Part
I: Getting Started
The
first several lessons are dedicated to helping students select
their topic, prepare a writing plan and create an interesting
beginning. In all of these lessons, students will receive the
instructional support they need by intensive modeling. It may
be helpful to think of an interesting memory of your own - either
from the field trip or from some other activity - that you
can use to model the writing process to your students.
Step #1 (Intro) |
Discussion: Read aloud
the book I'm in Charge of Celebration by
Bryd Baylor. This a beautiful book that gives a wonderful
example of writing personal narrative entries about important
experiences in nature. Class discussion. Which celebration
did you enjoy most? How did the girl say her experience changed
her? Guide discussion about how our experiences have the
power to change us - the way we think, feel or act. Model: Think
aloud as you make a list of Hidden Villa experiences that
were fun, important
or meaningful. Students Think-Pair-Share about
their own experiences. Individual: In
notebooks, students start a list of possible narrative topics.
If there is time, next to each topic they should jot down why this belongs on their list of special experiences. Support: Students
share their lists of possible narrative topics in small groups
to help each other choose the one Hidden
Villa experience that they think will make the best story. |
Step#2 (Web Plan) |
Discussion: Explain
that in a personal narrative, the beginning usually "sets-the
stage" and shows
what happened
leading up to the
special experience. The middle usually relates the most
exciting, interesting or important action of the memory.
The end generally
shows how the experience ended, and includes how you felt
or were changed by the experience. Model: Show
how you decided on the three stages for your own chosen memory
and create
a
free-form
web of all the details you can remember of each stage. Support: Allow
students 5-10 minutes to talk in pairs about their chosen
memories. Individual: Students
work on their own webs. You may want to offer them a photocopied work page to help them organize their ideas. This
step may take more than one writing period.
|
Step #3 (Good Beginnings) |
Discussion: The
beginning of a story needs to hook the readers and lure
them to continue reading. Model: Share
four different possible beginnings to your own story.
The first
one should be as boring as possible. Elicit student response.
Then share one of each type of interesting beginnings:
- Description
- Dialog
- Action
Discuss
each beginning and make a class chart with explanations
and examples. Support: in
pairs students read a list of exemplary story beginnings
(worksheet) and decide
together in which category each belongs. Share favorites
as a class. Individual: In
their writer's notebooks students write at least three
different
ways to start their own story
- one of each type. |
Step
#4 (Starting Drafts) |
Before
class, write the first paragraph of your personal narrative
on an overhead. Model: Re-read
all of the possible beginnings to your personal
narrative. Share your thinking about how you
chose which beginning to use. With class, read through the
entire first paragraph of your narrative. Help students notice
how you incorporated the different ideas from your web (from
step #2) into your paragraph. Support: In
pairs, students share their possible narrative beginnings
to help each other
choose which one to use and decide how to proceed. Individual: In
their notebooks on a new page, students copy down the
one good beginning they chose and then continue with the
rough draft of their story. |
Part II: The Rough Draft
Writing
the rough draft can take between a day to over a week,
depending on your student's writing level, the length
of the story they have to tell and their individual work pace.
There are many different writing mini-lessons that you could
teach before each writing period. Included here are the mini-lessons of two topics that consistently challenge my students during this writing project. For
more writers' workshop mini-lesson ideas I recommend
you go directly to the masters and read one of Lucy Calkin's
many acclaimed books, Wondrous Words by Katie Wood Ray
or books by Ralph Fletcher.
Step #1 (show not tell) |
Discussion: Explain
that many times students are tempted to give a one-sentence
summary
of an
action.
This
is okay
when the action is unimportant to the overall point of the
story. In general, students' stories can benefit
from more detailed actions to lead us through the story,
rather than a mere summary. Model: Make
up a few summary sentences for your personal narrative. (Ex:
I hiked up the
hill in the morning. Then I saw a coyote.) Elicit student
comments. Grammatically, the sentences are correct. So, what
is missing? Demonstrate how you pick apart each of these
actions into several sub-actions (Hike up the hill: finding
the trail head, getting
started, looking at scenery). Have students help you think
of ideas for the second action (Saw a coyote). Leave a chart
of this lesson up where students can refer to it. Support: In
pairs students help each other find summarized actions
in
their
own rough
drafts and pick them apart into sub-actions. Individual: Students
continue writing their rough drafts on their own, thinking
of ways to expand each important action as they
go. Share student successes with the class. |
Step #2 (personal reflection) |
Discussion: At
the end of their Hidden Villa personal narratives, I
ask my students to include a reflection
about how this
experience
has changed them. Reflecting on how our experiences influence
and change us is a new skill for many students. Supporting students in developing this skill will help them own and claim responsibility for learning. Model: Give a few
examples from your own life. You may want to
re-read I'm
in Charge of Celebrations at this time, as the author comments
about how her experience in nature changed the
way she thinks and feels. You could also re-read favorite
read aloud books and discuss how the main character's experiences
in the story changed him or her. (Ex: In Stelaluna by
Jannel Cannon, Stelaluna's experience of re-connecting with
other
bats changed the way
she perceived herself and increased her self-esteem.) Support: Have
students work together in pairs to talk about how their experiences
influenced them. Or, make an appointment to talk
with students individually if this task is particularly challenging
(self-reflection is challenging even for many adults!). |
Examples |
Students experiences do not have to be dramatic in order to be powerful. Here are examples of changes my students noticed. Experience: Milking
cow Change: Now I appreciate how hard it must be to produce
the milk I drink in the morning. Experience: Planting
seeds Change: I feel excited to see how these plants
grow. I am more interested in how my food is produced.
Experience: Night hike Change: I am a lot less afraid
of the dark. |
Part III: Revise, Edit and Publish
When students begin finishing up their rough draft, review with your class how to conduct a student revision conference. Each teacher has his or her own way to go about this task. However, when reviewing your students' rough drafts, I recommend using a checklist specific to each writing genre. Being
a revision advisor is challenging. I believe strongly in
holding students accountable for doing a good job. I particularly
want students to demonstrate the ability to revise and refine
the specific elements we focused on in my mini-lessons.
I
separate the steps of revision and
editing, since students should focus on different aspects
of their writing in each step. You may want to devise a checklist
for your students' editing conferences as well. In this
way they can be held accountable for particular grammar rules,
sight words or vocabulary words they have been studying.
When
your students have finished publishing their personal narratives,
I encourage some sort of celebration, particularly
since this project not only represents student's writing
progress, but also their experiences on the Hidden Villa
field trip.
You may consider extending this writing project into a family-school
activity, which reinforces student learning, informs parents
about class field trips and standards, and involves the family
in your students' learning. Or, you may want to touch on
Oral Presentation standards by organizing an evening of sharing
in which students read from their personal narratives and
share pictures or drawings from the field trip. |
