Personal Narrative Terminology

A personal memory moment with snapshots, thoughtshots, a life lesson, and emotions.

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NOT a summary of a cool vacation....

What is a personal narrative?

• digital spiral notebook to store ideas

• running google doc full of drafts

• do not turn in until the END of the unit

• teacher may "peak" at your progress and leave comments

• quick write (10-15 min)

• get ideas out

• no worries about mechanics

• determines if there's really a story to tell

• *** You will be writing 3 flashdrafts. From those 3 options, you will choose one to blow up into a full narrative

• develop your flashdrafts with more ideas and structure

• add content and ideas

• rearrange order

• don't be afraid to delete, add, exaggerate

• this piece of work will be revised and edited as many times as it takes

Revise: add or delete CONTENT (ideas and meaning)

Edit: fix mechanics like spelling, capitalization, etc.

*Use the Zoom button to examine the venn diagram on the right

• end product

• ready for perfection

• checks all the boxes on the rubric

*engage your reader from the start

Brigid happily snapped her wintergreen gum as she ran to gather with her classmates in the enclosed brick prayer garden at St. Monica Academy. Parents encircled the relieved kids to snap pictures for their Facebook pages. Excitement was in the air- literally with blue and white mortar boards soaring to dark starry night. The air was heavy with the smell of freshly cut spring grass and a loud backdrop of droning crickets. It was graduation night. This scene of forty exhausted, yet excited, eighth grade graduates promised us a feeling of accomplishment and hopes for high school.

​A snapshot is when the author provides a vivid and descriptive scene for the reader to picture the scene (like a movie in your mind). The writer uses all the senses to create that picture (hear, see, smell, feel, taste).

• when the author thinks to themself

• stream of consciousness (the on-going inner voice inside your head)

• running thoughts, feelings, sensations

the freedom to exaggerate, stray from the truth a bit, or break some rules in writing... for the purpose of a good story

Like when your mom blows up a story about you, when she's gossiping on the phone with her friends!