What’s My Story?

What’s something you have learned about growing up, becoming your own person, and finding your way in the world? How can you use the tools of personal narrative to compel your audience?

Students will create a writing portfolio that includes a life map, 100-word memoir, and personal narrative.

Students compose a literary analysis commentary in which they analyze either a classmate’s essay or their own essay.

Options include sharing writing portfolios, a “Moth”-style public sharing of stories, readings at a library or coffee house, and more.

General ELA classes, especially in grades 10 and 11 where students are preparing to write a college essay

W.11-12.3: Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.
W.11-12.1: (for Literary Analysis) Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.
W.11-12.5: Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on addressing what is most significant for a specific purpose and audience.

RL.11-12.3: Analyze the impact of the author’s choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama
RL.11-12.5: Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure specific parts of a text (e.g., the choice of where to begin or end a story, the choice to provide a comedic or tragic resolution) contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact.