Paragraph Writing—



Sequenced Writing Instruction

Personal Narrative

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By Lindsey Brown

English 443, Spring 2007

Personal Narrative Writing

I. Introduction

II. Beginning

a. Envisioning: Who are you, anyway?

b. Brainstorm

c. Description: vivid words.

III. Creating

a. Paragraph Logic

a. Paragraph writing.

b. Transitions: connecting paragraphs.

IV. Summarizing

a. Thesis statements

b. Introduction and conclusion paragraph writing.

V. Finalize

a. Peer Edit

b. Teacher Edit

c. Type, print, turn in.

VI. Assessment

a. 6-Trait

b. Workshop method

Introduction

This Sequenced Writing assignment is designed to help students produce a Personal Narrative that answers the basic question, “Who Are You, Anyway?” There are a number of steps outlined in this activity packet, beginning with the writing prompts. The rubric at the end of the packet is intended to be given to all students at the very start of this unit. Also, a sample essay, written to the prompt, is provided to model for students the intended outcome for the prompt.

The first assignment, “Who Are You, Anyway?” is a brainstorming assignment where students are asked to come up with as many words describing who they are as possible. The next five handouts are graphic organizers with which to expand upon the final choice word decided upon in the previous assignment. Once students come up with a word describing their selves like “friendly,” they can then place this word at the center of the pentagon and come up with people, places, events, and objects that are connected with their world.

After the expansion of the main idea through the graphic organizers, students are asked to do an assignment that will help them in their writing process by providing them with more vivid methods of description. Students are asked to write at least one word from each graphic organizer in the columns. After choosing the word, the student is to come up with as many descriptive words concerning their main word as possible. For example, if a student picked the word “friendly,” and then expanded that to include their mother from the graphic organizer for people having to do with this trait, they would need to come up with all the words that they could use to VIVIDLY describe their mother and her relation to the student’s “friendly” aspects. Remember that in this exercise students should show and not tell. Ex: red hair, giant smile, crows feet around her eyes, bubbly, etc.

From this point students should begin to write a paragraph for each of the aspects of their main idea about themselves, i.e. a paragraph for each word on the Vivid Descriptives handout. If there are any students who seem to be struggling with the writing of the paragraph in general, there is a step provided in the sequence for the scaffolding of paragraph writing. This handout, “Paragraph Logic,” can be used for those students struggling with this part of the essay writing process. Also, as students draft their essays and paragraphs, giving them the handout on transitions may be helpful. Finally, students are given the handout on writing introductions and conclusions so that they can tie it all together.

When students have completed their rough drafts, there are revision and editing materials included at the end of the unit. It will be helpful for many students to look at the sample essay on the overhead to see how the teacher would score the essay and also to be given a model of how to evaluate one another when peer editing.

In the end, it is always best if the student’s writing can be shared with an audience in an authentic way. Anyone using these materials is encouraged to find a way to make this happen for the students.

Sample Essay: Who Am I?

I am a person without culture. My blood runs from Native American and Norwegian lines both, but I have been given no ability to express this in my life. My dad’s heritage as an American Indian was stolen from us; my mother’s Norwegian background merely trickled through the more devastating and convulsive stages of her life that destroyed her hold on her past like a storm ripping through the canvas upon a fragile sail boat’s masts. And, like a sail boat without its sails, I am continuously adrift in a cultural void of being.

My father was adopted by Caucasian parents. At the time, it was unfashionable to be a person of color. My grandparents weren’t racist intentionally, but they were influenced by society’s ideas of worth in general. They paid the doctors at the hospital where the adoption took place, so the story goes, to write the magic word under the blank space intended to denote a newborn’s race: Caucasian. In this one gesture, the doctor’s latex covered hands smoothly signed away the thousands of years of culture that lay behind the mother my father never knew.

My mother was a young woman with children before she ever knew the value of history. Her arms full of babies and diapers, her mind full of the decisions of responsibility like which day care and which formula: she never realized how important the past can be to hold within your hands like the precious jewels of heredity. The few remnants of Norway that had trickled down, unintentionally into my mother’s world consisted of two recipes: one for cookies at Christmas time and one for a chicken soup to soothe the sickest of friends.

These recipes are in my possession, I have some aspect of some culture in this way. In this same, ephemeral way I possess a remnant of my father’s heritage in the form of a buck knife. It is not so much that the smooth crafted wood hilt covering the full, silver, metal length of the blade that makes up this glimmering point in my hands actually came from a Native American culture as that it represents my father’s attempts to become a part of a culture he had been denied. He failed, ultimately, to reclaim a true grasp on his past- and so I was also denied this chance through his failure.

When I went to college for the first time, people talked so much of race and heritage and identity and……. All the things I couldn’t belong to. I felt so left out, like I looked in on them from a vast distance with miles of snow and ice between us, a draft sneaking up to the tips of my ear-tops. They would ask me what I was; I would answer Native American and Norwegian, always hoping they wouldn’t ask me to explain more or prove it. Always, I hoped they wouldn’t look further to see what I didn’t possess- what had been robbed from me.

I am a person without a culture and, like a knife with only a designated meaning or a self imposed purpose, I can only vaguely represent a past I have no experience with. I can only drift through a sea of culture while the breeze blows past me, wandering.

Possible Prompts

Some advanced students may be ready to simply write their essay without much scaffolding. For these students, in order to differentiate instruction, the following prompts may be used to begin the envisioning process of writing:

1) People often judge each other by appearances and other, surface value criteria. When we are judged, we may feel it is unfair for others to assume they know anything about us.

If you had to explain who you really were to the rest of the world (or at least to your peers), what would you say? Who are you, anyway?

2) If you had to pick the people, places, events, and objects of your life that best explain or describe who you really are, what would you choose? Tell us who you are by showing us these important parts of your life that have helped shape you and serve to represent aspects of yourself.

Who Are You, Anyway Name________________

Use the space below to write as MANY WORDS AS POSSIBLE about who you are. Don’t be afraid to write ANY TYPE of word- you can write adjectives, adverbs, objects (like iPod, etc.), sports or anything else you want! ---Try to write at least thirty words down!!!---

Narrow it down--- Now that you’ve brainstormed, which types of words occur most often? Is there a theme that you notice? Pick just four or five of the words that seem most broad or repetitive.

Finalize--- Out of the few words you’ve narrowed it down to, pick only one word that will be your final word that describes who you really are! (If you HAVE TO you can pick two words)

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Paragraph Logic

Take the sentences provided below and, working alone on a separate piece of paper, construct a paragraph by putting the sentences in any order that makes sense to you. When you have finished, get into groups of four and share your conclusions.

Paragraph A

____The "backwoods" of society have left their influence deeply ingrained in my bones.

____Although life has not always seemed so simple and carefree, I have realized that my life is exactly what I make of it.

____I grew up in the forgotten stretches of Montana and North Dakota.

____If there is anything I cannot do it is simply because I have set some restriction on myself.

____All of my limitations are of my own creation; therefore, I choose to make my life one liberated from any and all confinements.

____I am free.

____This helped me develop an appreciation for the simplicity inherent in life.

____Country is in my blood.

Paragraph B

____ I was made to realize that people are not always who they seem to be.

____ Sometimes, we are forced into our discoveries harshly; other times, we are free to choose which path is our own.

____ People’s roles in my life aren't always what they are supposed to be.

____ Finding an identity is something we all struggle with through our adolescent years.

____ In turn, I discovered a truth in myself that I had needed to find.

____ I was one of the unlucky ones who was pushed into my awareness of who I was and what it meant to me.

____ Growing up is a time of figuring out who you are.

____This truth helped me to realize concretely what it was I was doing with this life of mine.

Who Are You, Anyway? - Transitions

Now that you are done writing your details and descriptions, write a paragraph for each column/aspect of who you are.

When you are finished writing your paragraphs, connect all of them in an order that makes sense to you. Use the following words or any others you can think of to transition from one paragraph to the next.

|If You Are: |Use These Words: |

|Narrating, describing, or writing about |After, during, next, again, every time, the next|

|processes that include time references: |day, always, finally, then, before, meanwhile, |

| |while. |

|Explaining the relative importance of |First, less important, second, more important, |

|things or ideas: |mainly. |

|Comparing and contrasting: |Also, on the contrary, similarly, as, unlike, |

| |also, either . . .or, than, however, in the same|

| |way, likewise, instead, yet, neither . . .nor, |

| |but. |

|Describing cause-and effect relationships: |Although, as a result, since, because, if, then,|

| |so that, consequently, for this reason, |

| |therefore. |

| | |

|Introducing examples: |As, namely, such as, for example, like, to |

| |illustrate. |

|Signaling emphasis: |Indeed, in other words, in fact. |

|Offering more information: |In addition, similarly, also, moreover, besides,|

| |furthermore. |

Who Are You, Anyway? Name_____________

Introductions and Conclusions

Write one sentence about the MAIN IDEA of your essay below. This is your thesis sentence.

Now write a few sentences that preview what you will tell us in your essay. Briefly mention the main ideas of the paragraphs that will follow this introductory paragraph.

So, what? After we’ve finished reading your essay, what is the one thing you’d like us to have gotten from it? Is there an aspect of who you are that only becomes apparent after we’ve read the entire essay? Write a sentence that either summarizes your essay or gives us a fresh idea of who you are, given what you’ve told us already.

Now it’s time to draft your final essay!!!

Self Revision Name________________________

Now that you’ve written your essay, it’s time to look at it anew: it’s time for revision!

Read over your finalized essay. After you’ve done this, read through it again, this time scoring yourself on the rubric for the paper. Give yourself a score for each criteria. Why did you choose this score? Write a paragraph for each score you gave yourself, justifying your score. Use the back of this paper if you’d like.

Now that you’ve scored yourself, do you see any room for improvement? Try to spot specific things about your paper that you can change. Go back through and make some of these changes. Be sure to keep an eye out for the specific things you are working on, as indicated on your Conventions editing sheet.

Finally, when you are done with the previous steps, take some time to simply read your paper aloud. Read it to yourself or someone else. In doing so, you may find that you can hear when something is incorrect or clumsy better than you can see it. If you run into an awkward sounding part of the essay, consider rewriting or rewording it to make it sound better. It is also helpful to have someone else read your essay aloud to you. Make sure that they understand that they shouldn’t change anything while they read, but simply read the essay EXACTLY as it is. This should help you spot some trouble spots in your piece of writing. Good luck!

Sample Essay

This is a sample student essay to score on the overhead, using the rubric

Saying the Pledge: Is it Legally Right?

I disagree with the bill requiring the public schools of Alaska to recite the Pledge of Allegiance daily in the classroom. My major opposition to this bill is the law of separation of church and state, and how this disobeys the law immensely. Also it depletes classroom time further, and some statements do not register in all areas to all people of the United States.

In the pledge of Allegiance it says “in one nation under god”, many people in many different religions do not acknowledge “God” as their supreme ruler and do not pray to him, but another higher being. Also if one religion is represented by saying god, all other religions are supposed, under law, to be represented.

Another major reason I oppose the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance daily in the public classroom is that it further depletes the teaching and learning time given to teachers and students. As teachers already complain that they do not have sufficient time to complete their assigned curriculum and then with the Pledge of Allegiance it further lessens the teaching time available to work on projects, class work, or lecturing.

To me the entire Pledge of Allegiance is not even correct. As it states “With liberty and justice for all”, which in America is the way life is supposed to be, but in actuality doesn’t happen. Children in inner-city schools, immigrants, and homeless people do not receive the same rights and justice that those of us who live in middle class America enjoy. In my opinion a student feels he or she need to recite the pledge of Allegiance daily to fulfill their duty as American citizens, then I feel they should either make time at home, or before class starts in the morning. As it should be a personal choice if one feels they need to renew their patriotism daily or if we know it enough from when we recited it daily in second grade.

These are just some of the reasons I feel that the Pledge of Allegiance should not be recited by requirement in classrooms in the high school level daily as Bill:CSHB 192 states it should.

Peer Feedback Sheet Name____________________

Author being Evaluated________________________________

Grammar & Spelling 1 2 3 4

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Introduction 1 2 3 4

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Sequencing 1 2 3 4

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Conclusion 1 2 3 4

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Adding Personality 1 2 3 4

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

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Word Choice 1 2 3 4

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

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Support for Topic 1 2 3 4

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

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Attach this sheet to every piece of writing you submit!! Name_______________________________

|Convention |Self Edit |Peer Edit |Teach. Edit |Teacher Comments |

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