A lecture about narrative writing and the writing process.

1. NARRATIVE WRITING
Steps Chap 3

2. *Review
•Paragraphs must have:
•A topic sentence that
communicates the writer’s
main idea and the author’s
purpose;
•Plenty of vivid, supporting
details.
Point
Support
Paragraph

3. Narrative Writing
•Narrative Writing--writing that tells a story by presenting
events in an orderly, logical sequence.
•Narratives always have a purpose—the writer has a reason
he/she wants to tell this story.
• What is Malcolm X’s purpose in “Prison Studies”?

4. Important Features
•Topic sentence provides the main idea and the purpose of the
story
•Unified details create a vivid picture for the reader
•Story follows chronological order, meaning that all events are
depicted in the order they happened
• Beginning
• Middle (turning point—what changed?)
• End
•Story is in past tense.

5. Excerpt from “Prison Studies”
I suppose it was inevitable that as my word base broadened, I could
for the first time pick up a book and read and now begin to understand
what the book was saying. Anyone who had read a great deal can
imagine the new world that opened. Let me tell you something: From
then until I left that prison, in every free moment I had, if I was not
reading in the library, I was reading on my bunk. You couldn't have
gotten me out of books with a wedge. Between Mr. Muhammad's
teachings, my correspondence, my visitors--usually Ella and Reginald--
and my reading of books, months passed without my even thinking
about being imprisoned. In fact, up to then, I never had been so truly free
in my life.

6. Coherence
• It is the writer’s job to make the connections between their
ideas apparent to the reader.
•Coherence—all parts of a paragraph fit together in a clear,
logical order.
•Identify the major stages in your essay!
• Focus on chronological order—events are depicted in
the order they occurred.
• 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 NOT 6, 4, 1, 3, 2

7. Transitions
•Transition words or
transition phrases are
words that that connect
the ideas in an essay.
•Transitions mark the
stages of the
story…the
chronology.
For Showing Time:
• After
• Before
• During
• Earlier
• Later
• Meanwhile
• Since
• Soon
• Then
• While
• The next
day…
• That
afternoon…

8. THE WRITING PROCESS
Exploring Writing p 21-49

9. Goals of the Writing Process
1. Develop a topic sentence—the first sentence of a
paragraph that communicates the main idea
2. Develop support for the topic sentence
3. Organize the support in a draft
4. Revise and edit for an error-free essay

10. Prewriting
•When you receive a prompt or choose your own subject
to write about, you need to explore what you know
about it.
•What are some prewriting techniques discussed in
Exploring Writing?

11. Prewriting Techniques
• Mistakes don’t count
•Remember all of the details, ask all of the questions, and
explain all of your opinions that you can
•Exercise: Using the prewriting technique you
described in your study questions, prewrite about a
negative experience that had a positive outcome (3-5
minutes).

12. Outline
Outlines help you to make sense of your prewriting.
1. Choose the main idea of your prewriting (topic
sentence)
2. List the major supporting points in a logical order
Write a scratch outline of your prewriting.

13. Writing Topic Sentences
•Your topic sentence needs to give boundaries to your essay.
• It needs to communicate your main idea (negative experience).
• It needs to communicate your purpose (positive
outcome/consequences).
•Student Example: “It took losing my pants to find out that true
friends will always be there for you.”

14. Sample Outline
I. Topic Sentence
II. Beginning—Explain the negative experience.
• What happened, briefly? Choose your details carefully—get the most
bang for your buck!
III. Middle—Explain the turning point of the experience.
• What about the experience became positive?
• How/when did you know it was positive?
• What about you/the situation changed?
IV. End—Conclude your story.
• What are the lasting effects of this experience on your life?
• What did you learn about yourself?

15. Drafting
•Follow your outline to write the first draft of your
paragraph
•Don't know how to start/end your paragraph? Write your
supporting details first
•Warning! This draft is NEVER the finished draft. Your
essay should change drastically from this first draft.
• Typed or handwritten…you choose

16. Revising and Editing
Revising Editing