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Common Core Writing Standards: Prewrite for Effective Narrative Essays
The most effective writing is revised writing. We all believe that. Yet, in schools, it’s frequently hard to get students to revise. If that’s the case, offer a rich prewriting experience with many different prewriting exercises. The resulting drafts are going to be improved.
Here are the top three prewriting activities for writing narratives, either true or imagined. Employ all 3 all at once! That’s the important thing, use a rich prewriting environment.
ORAL STORYTELLING Allowing students to tell a narrative to a peer about a personal experience is often a strong prewriting tool.
Work with a timer. Set a kitchen timer for 1-2 minutes (depending on grade level) and permit students tell a narrative for a set amount of time. This structure preserves classroom control, but allows students to rehearse an account orally.
Limit topics. You can focus narrative essays right from the start by the instructions on what variety of story to tell. Stories must be about a thing that took place inside a short amount of time, maybe Thirty minutes. In place of telling about the 3-day vacation to 6 Flags, tell about the 30-minutes you were standing in line waiting for the roller coaster, then the ride itself and finally the feelings you had after riding.
Tell it all over again. Ask pupils to tell the story again – another way. Revising orally is indeed much simpler even more enjoyable than revising on paper. Request a minimum of 3 different variations. Start off in a different place, end in a different location, include new details, take into consideration how you’d tell it in a different way to different audiences.
WORD BANK. A word bank is really a listing of possible words or phrases to use in writing; they don’t need to use every one of these words and they may use any new words they think of when they write. It’s merely a prewriting exercise that encourages students to think about word possibilities before they write. Develop a word bank of solid verbs which might be used in the essay anywhere you want. Use other kinds of word banks as necessary for your course and subjects.
SENSORY DETAILS. One style of word bank that is especially beneficial in writing narratives is a sensory details word bank. For a prewriting activity, request students to write a minimum of three specific details per sense (see, hear, smell, taste, touch). Encourage them to be as specific as is possible: not fish, but catfish; not catfish, but catfish with a bent tail. For older students, repeat this at three points within the story. Keep in mind it is a kind of word bank and you’re not interested in complete sentences here. It’s just a prewriting exercise that encourages pupils to keep in mind word possibilities before they write
Meet or exceed the Common Core Writing standards by focusing on the writing process, especially prewriting activities. It’s simple to develop effective narratives from students when they have a rich prewriting experience before they ever write a first draft.
