I hope you enjoyed the previous lesson on Building Suspense and Climax!  Today you will get ideas on how to teach students to develop characters in a narrative essay.

Developing Character:  Mentor Text:  Rotten Ritchie and the Ultimate Dare by Patricia Polacco

SKITTLE ACTIVITY:  Hand out a skittle to students and assign colors to a character trait or emotion.  Whatever color they receive, they have to tell or write about how to change a character with that trait or emotion.  When they finish, give them a handful!!!

Common Core Standard:  We can apply grade level Reading standards to literature (e.g., "Describe in depth a character, setting, or event in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text {e.g. a character's thoughts, words, or actions}.")

To write a well-crafter paper, show the development of the characters throughout the story.
*Did they change in any way?
*Were they bossy at the beginning and then caring towards the end?
*Did something happen to cause this damage?

There are two kinds of traits:
1.  Outside traits:  Physical traits that you can actually see.  (blonde, tall, messy hair, dirty clothes)
2.  Inside traits:  How the character feels or acts.  (bossy, lonely, mysterious, thoughtful, clumsy)

This is a great time to read from the book Rotten Ritchie and the Ultimate Dare.  Richie teases his sister Tricia about taking ballet.  Tricia knows how much work it takes so she challenges Ritchie to perform in her ballet recital.  Ritchie agrees, under one condition:  Tricia has to join his hockey team for the big game!  Ritchie's character changes throughout the story as he realizes how difficult it is to perform ballet.

Changes in Ritchie:  Teasing, belittling, disgusting to being respectful towards his sister's hard work.

In the class story, go through the characters and decide how they can change throughout the story.





If you would rather have all of the these mini lessons (over 400 pages) in one spot along with tracking forms, goal forms, prompts, practice sheets, etc, etc. Click INTERACTIVE NOTEBOOKS GRADES 1-8!  Boost those test scores while motivating students to write with a year-long writing program!

I hope you enjoyed learning suspense and climax! Next lesson will be DEVELOPING CHARACTERS
If you would rather have all of the these mini lessons (over 400 pages) in one spot along with tracking forms, goal forms, prompts, practice sheets, etc, etc. Click INTERACTIVE NOTEBOOKS GRADES 1-8!  Boost those test scores while motivating students to write with a year-long writing program!

Writing the Body Section of a Narrative Essay

After the introduction of a narrative essay, the next step is to write the body of the paper.  It is important to keep the events in sequential order.  Explain that this is the middle of the story where characters are developed and events show a heightened suspense and climax.  It needs to unfold naturally.  This is a great place to bring out the hamburger model to remind them that it is the "meat" of the story!  I like to explain the reason of using three fantabulous events to expound upon as having the Power of 3.  It is the perfect number of events for your story.  Then give details details details of each!  Review the slide of The Power of 3 and the class example with the students.  Or have the class develop the example together.  Last, have your writers take notes on the Body section and Power of 3.