Narrative Prompt - 1

A narrative prompt is when you write a story after reading a prompt. There can be three kinds of narrative prompts:• Fiction• Historical Narrative• Scientific Narrative

Steps to Take in Writing a Narrative Prompt Response

1. Read the prompt carefully. Understand what kind of prompt you are responding to.

2. Analyze the prompt for:• Structure of the prompt (Fiction only)• Themes/main ideas• Language• Specific style choices the author makes (Fiction only)• Setting (Fiction only)

3. Construct an appropriate graphic organizer to think through how you will respond.

4. Write your response – The response to a fictional story should start where the author left off.

5. Review what you have written

In a testing situation, you will have 50 minutes to write your response, but for the purposes of learning how to do it, we will take several days to practice each step.

Responding to Fiction - 2

Read The TextAsk yourself what you will be responding to: Fiction, Historical Account, or Scientific Narrative.

Analyze:Using the close-reading skills you are developing with the Notice and Note strategy, discover what you can about the following:

• Structure of the Prompt – In a fictional prompt, you will be given part of a story. This means that you will be given part of the plot sequence and part of the hero’s journey.In Your Writing Journal, Answer the Following Questions Thoroughly – In Full Sentences:• Which stages of the plot sequence have been covered

(exposition, rising action, etc.) and which still need to be written?

• Which stages of the hero’s journey have been covered (departure, initiation, etc.) and which still need to be written?

• Is there evidence of a special weapon or do you need to provide one?

• Who is the main character in his/her “before” state? What is holding him or her back from being in his/her true hero’s power?

• What will the climax or turning point be and how will it change things?

• What kind of an “after” state do you need to create? How will the character come into a hero’s power?

Responding to Fiction – Continued - 3

Analyze (Continued):• Themes or important ideas – List anything that comes up

again and again, or anything that the author seems to be trying to emphasize. Use the “Themes and Important Ideas” page in these notes for more ideas.

• Specific Style Choices the Author Makes– Use the Notice and Note strategies, and the ideas on the “Themes and Important Ideas” page in these notes to analyze the author’s stylistic choices.

• Setting – Write down what the setting is as it is described. Decide whether you need the setting to remain the same, or whether it should change as the character changes.

In Your Writing Journal or Using the Graphic Organizer Provided - Write down your analysis of each of these points after reading through the prompt. See next page for more information.

• Language – In Your Writing Journal and Using the Page Titled “Types of Language” in These Notes: list some examples of the kind of language used by the author including:

• Imagery• Metaphor/Simile• Personification• Hyperbole• Symbols

More information on these on the “Types of Language” page in these notes

Themes and Important Ideas - 4

Use the following list of common themes and ideas to see if you can identify any.

Themes• Curiosity vs. Denial

• Inner Truth

• Selfishness vs. Sacrifice

• Coming of Age

• Fear vs. Courage

• Community vs. Isolation

Important Ideas/Author’s Choices• Ongoing Metaphor or Again and Agains

• Established Relationships Between Characters

• Patterns in Sentence Structure

• Use of Internal Story vs. Action

• Setting

In Your Writing Journal or Using the Graphic Organizer Provided – Identify any themes or ideas you see and note down anything you notice about the author’s choices.

Constructing a Graphic Organizer - Structure - 5

Use the Following Graphic Organizer for Fiction to examine the author’s style:

Exposition – What do we learn about the character in his/her “before” state?  What is the situation?

Rising Action/Departure/Initiation/Road of Trials – What problem is presented?  What is blocking the character from dealing with it?

Innermost Cave – Has the character hit a low point yet, or do you need to get him/her to that point?

Climax – What will the character have to do to show he/she is now in his/her hero’s power?

Falling Action/Resolution/Return and Reintegration – How will you show the character in his/her “after” state?

Constructing a Graphic Organizer –Themes and Ideas – 6

Once you have analyzed the text, use the Following Graphic Organizer for Fiction to organize what you see in the text and where you will take it:

Themes

Ongoing Metaphors or Again and Agains

Established Relationships Between Characters

Patterns in Sentence Structure

Use of Internal Story vs. Action

Setting

Types of Language – 7

In Your Writing Journal – List significant examples of these types of language and your analysis of the impact of each.

Device Description Example

Imagery Language that is so descriptive it makes an image in the reader’s mind

Her dress was a loud, screaming, fire-engine red, which matched her nails and the 4-inch heels on her slender feet. Her eyes glittered as she sneered.

Metaphor/Simile Makes a comparison that is abstract or poetic

He was (like) the light of my life. I knew I would always be happy when he was around.

Personification When something that is not human is given human qualities

The soft breeze kissed my cheek as it wafted by.

Hyperbole Exaggeration “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse!

Symbol Something that represents a bigger idea

She clutched the necklace her father had given her. It was all she had left of him.

Editing Basics – 8

Verbs:Agreement – Subjects and verbs.

Tense – Check each verb – are they all in the same tense?

Variety – Are you using the same verbs over and over again?

Person – Does it switch anywhere from you to I, from I to they, from you to they or he/she? Have you taken “I” out of it, as in “I think”…

Word Variety – Are you using the same word over and over again?

Sentence Structure – Are your sentences varied and not all the same?

Spelling – Check for words the spell checker won’t pick up and incorrect duplicates ie. Aloud/Allowed

Capitalization – Beginning of sentences, and proper nouns

Sentences – Check for run-ons and fragments.

Strategy: • Read your piece backwards. This will help you find spelling

and technical errors.• Read it aloud to a partner – have the partner read it aloud to

you.

Sample Prompt - 9“Eleven” by Sandra Cisneros

What they don’t understand about birthdays and what they never tell you is that when you’re eleven, you’re also ten, and nine, and eight, and seven, and six, and five, and four, and three, and two, and one. And when you wake up on your eleventh birthday you expect to feel eleven, but you don’t. You open your eyes and everything’s just like yesterday, only it’s today. And you don’t feel eleven at all. You feel like you’re still ten. And you are – underneath the year that makes you eleven.

Like some days you might say something stupid, and that’s the part of you that’s still ten. Or maybe some days you might need to sit on your mama’s lap because you’re scared, and that’s the part of you that’s five. And maybe one day when you’re all grown up maybe you will need to cry like if you’re three, and that’s okay. That’s what I tell Mama when she’s sad and needs to cry. Maybe she’s feeling three.

Because the way you grow old is kind of like an onion or like the rings inside a tree trunk or like my little wooden dolls that fit one inside the other, each year inside the next one. That’s how being eleven years old is.

You don’t feel eleven. Not right away. It takes a few days, weeks even, sometimes even months before you say Eleven when they ask you. And you don’t feel smart eleven, not until you’re almost twelve. That’s the way it is. Only today I wish I didn’t have only eleven years rattling around inside me like pennies in a tin Band-Aid box. Today I wish I was one hundred and two instead of eleven because if I was one hundred and two I’d have known what to say when Mrs. Price put the red sweater on my desk. I would’ve known how to tell her it wasn’t mine instead of just sitting there with that look on my face and nothing coming out of my mouth.

“Whose is this?” Mrs. Price says, and she holds the red sweater up in the air for all the class to see. “Whose? It’s been sitting in the coatroom for a month.”

“Not mine,” says everybody. “Not mine.”“It has to belong to somebody,” Mrs. Price keeps saying, but nobody can

remember. It’s an ugly sweater with red plastic buttons and a collar and sleeves all stretched out like you could use it for a jump rope. It’s maybe a thousand years old and even if it belonged to me I wouldn’t say so.

Maybe because I’m skinny, or maybe because she doesn’t like me, that stupid Sylvia Saldivar says, “I think it belongs to Rachel.”

An ugly sweater like that, all raggedy and old, but Mrs. Price believes her. Mrs. Price takes the sweater and puts it right on my desk, but when I open my mouth nothing comes out.

“That’s not, I don’t, you’re not…Not mine,” I finally say in a little voice that was maybe me when I was four.

“Of course it’s yours,” Mrs. Price says. “I remember you wearing it once.”Because she’s old and the teacher, she’s right and I’m not.

Sample Graphic Organizer - Structure - 10

Use the Following Graphic Organizer for Fiction to examine the author’s style:

Exposition – What do we learn about the character in his/her “before” state?  What is the situation?

Rachel is timid, scared to speak up for herself – trapped in “six” – she has just turned eleven.

Rising Action/Departure/Initiation/Road of Trials – What problem is presented?  What is blocking the character from dealing with it?

Rachel is given a sweater that is not hers.  She is intimidated by her teacher and by Sylvia.  She is embarrassed to have people think it is hers, but too timid to speak up.

Innermost Cave – Has the character hit a low point yet, or do you need to get him/her to that point?

It looks like Rachel is about to hit a low point – The sweater is on her desk and she’s feeling bad.  I could extend that low point for a little bit to emphasize her transformation. – She needs to struggle with wishing she were a hundred and two – then she needs to realized something that makes her ready to make a sacrifice and be twenty.  Maybe it should be Sylvia’s sweater.

Climax – What will the character have to do to show he/she is now in his/her hero’s power?

She returns the sweater to Sylvia quietly, without drawing attention, and without judgment.  She does not correct Mrs. Price, but lets Sylvia know that she knows.

Falling Action/Resolution/Return and Reintegration – How will you show the character in his/her “after” state?

Sylvia will react with resignation and Rachel will finally feel eleven.

Sample Graphic Organizer – Themes and Ideas - 11

Once you have analyzed the text, use the Following Graphic Organizer for Fiction to organize what you see in the text and where you will take it:

ThemesComing of Age – This is all about turning eleven and becoming old enough to not be intimidated,

to learn to stand up for yourself.  It means acting eleven instead of six.Fear vs. Courage – She must move past fear and learn that courage means being afraid but doing it

anyway.

Ongoing Metaphors or Again and AgainsThe idea of being all ages at the same time

Lots of metaphors to describe – trees, onion, dollExamples of things you do at different ages – how actions you take have ages

Established Relationships Between CharactersIt seems that she is close to her Mama

She has a negative relationship with SylviaShe is afraid of her teacher

Her teacher does not “see” her

Patterns in Sentence StructureShe starts a lot of sentences with conjunctions – and, or, like, only

She repeats for emphasis, maybe, not mine,She is using the present tense

She uses “you” when she is being reflective about life

Use of Internal Story vs. ActionShe starts with a lot of reflection and then transitions into the action.

SettingThere is not much written about the setting.  It is clear through the action, that it is taking place in

a classroom.

Sample Narrative Response to: - 13“Eleven” by Sandra Cisneros

“Fine, Mrs. Price. It’s mine.” I sit there in hesitation. I know the sweater isn’t mine at all. Not mine. I feel six, accepting any and all orders from my teacher. I remember when I was younger and the teacher represented some all-judging god. And I let Mrs. Price be right, because I don’t know how an eleven year old should act in this situation.

Our class spends the next thirty minutes working on our spelling unit. S-A-C-R-I-F-I-C-E is the last word on the sheet. I think about what this word means. I guess at eleven you have to surrender (or S-A-C-R-I-F-I-C-E) a piece of yourself just to move on. I gave up the last bowl of cereal this morning to my little sister, Kate. I gave up my baby blanket when my baby brother was born two months ago. I have given up a lot to be eleven.

The pencil sharpener races as Sylvia Saldivar stands and cranks the handle. She shoots a sinister little smile my way. I look back blankly. She wears an older, orange cardigan. The brightness from that orange pierces through my eyes, like when the sun bounces off my bike reflector on the hottest day of summer. It is almost painful.

I want to be twenty or thirty in that moment so that I can stare Sylvia down and win this silent confrontation. Maybe the orange is too much for me, or maybe it’s just that I’m not twenty, I’m only eleven, and I can’t hold her gaze. I look away from her and back to the red sweater, hanging over the back of my desk chair.

Suddenly, an idea falls into my head, rolls around for a bit and then settles at the center of my brain. I start to examine the sweater more closely, looking for some kind of clue. Mrs. Price tells me to get back to work. Sylvia laughs as her lanky arm covers her spelling worksheet. Everyone else continues with their work.

The bell rings for recess. As everyone puts on their extra layers, I pick up the sweater again and check the tag. I am almost sure of what I will find there, and I am right. It is labeled “S.S.”

I look at Sylvia in her screaming orange sweater, then the tag again and all my frustration with her melts away. I actually feel bad for her. As everyone filters out of the classroom, I quietly place the sweater by Sylvia’s classroom locker. It lies there sadly. Sylvia looks over at me, then looks down and sighs.

I give her a small smile and head out the door. And I feel eleven for the first time that day.