Lesson 31: Look Both Ways and Thank You M'am, Narrative Writing, Part 5

Instruct students to take out their homework from the previous lesson.

• Say: After yesterday’s lesson, you began to brainstorm details for an ordinary event or day in the life of a character from Look Both Ways. You chose the character and one new event or characteristic to be introduced in your story, and you started to think about your pacing.

Turn and Talk

• Say these Directions: Turn to a partner, and discuss the ideas you developed. Focus on how you’re going to reveal the new event or characteristic through pacing. Will the new event be revealed right away, or will you build up to it? Will events unfold slowly or quickly?

  • I chose to write about Kenzi, and I want to show that he’s nervous and sad about taking a fitness test in gym class because his brother would have been the one to help him with it. I want to start by writing about how nervous he is and not share the part about gym class until the end.

Connection to Today’s Learning

• Say: Today, you’re going to plan your writing with a focus on pacing. Then you’re going to write a short paragraph based on your plan.

Modeled Writing

Say these Directions: Today, you will plan a narrative by moving from an idea to a sequence to an outline. As you watch the model, pay attention to how a writer can decide what to reveal, when to reveal it, and how details can slow down or speed up the story.

Remind students of the previous academic discussion lesson, which focused on the importance of pacing to build tension and create greater empathy for characters. Briefly revisit the discussion of how pacing helped build empathy for the characters in “The Low Cuts Strike Again.”

• Ask: Remember how we learned more and more about the Low Cuts over the course of their story? How did the pacing of that story make the story more interesting and build empathy for the characters? What would have happened if all the information had been shared at the very beginning?

  • The way the author feeds the information slowly tricks the reader into making assumptions and judgments about the characters. First, you think they’re just stealing for fun or greed. Then you learn they are poor and their parents are cancer survivors, so you understand a little better, but you still think they’re mostly just stealing to get candy for themselves. Then you find out that they are stealing to help get Bit’s mom ice cream while she recovers from chemotherapy. If all this were revealed at once, the reader wouldn’t change their mind as they read. This transformation helps the reader connect with the characters.

Introduce and model the process of going from idea to sequence to outline to plan a story’s pacing. Think out loud as you move through each step of the pre-writing process and make decisions around how to organize and pace the events and/or information in your paragraph. You can create the sequence and outline ahead of time, but make sure to talk about the thought process as you present.

• Say: As you follow the model, notice how the story is organized into parts and how each part adds new information. Pay attention to where sensory details and feelings are added to make the pacing more effective.

• Say: I’m going to start with a basic idea: Kenzi has a fitness test in gym class today. I have new information I want to introduce: he’s nervous about it. Finally, the surprise: he’s nervous because his brother was the one who would’ve helped him prepare. I’m going to start my outline with those three big ideas.

• Say: Next, I’m going to think of a sequence. How do I want to get from my new idea to introducing the information to revealing the surprise? I think I’ll go in chronological order. But I’ll add a flashback at the very end!

• Say: Finally, I’m going to add details about how Kenzi feels. I’m also going to add sensory details. That means details that are usually felt by the five senses, such as smells or things that can be heard or touched. I’ll add those under each of my three main parts.

Distribute copies of the model outline, or display it where students can see it:

I: Part 1

A. Kenzi has a fitness test in the gym.

• 1. The gym smells bad.

  2. The teacher’s whistle is really loud.

II: Part 2

A. Kenzi is nervous about a test in gym today.

1. His heart is beating fast.

2. Kenzi does not feel ready.

3. He trained for a long time, but then he stopped.

III: Part 3

A. Kenzi is nervous because he misses his brother.

1. Kenzi’s brother was helping him practice.

2. After his brother went to jail, he just stopped practicing.

3. Kenzi decides to try his best anyway to make his brother proud.

• Say: I might not use every single detail here, but now I know how I’m going to organize my story and what is going to happen in each paragraph. I also have a bunch of possible details to choose from. Now, I’m ready to write!

Connection to Today’s Learning

• Say: Now you’re going to pre-write your narratives by turning your ideas into a sequence and outline. Then you will discuss what kinds of choices you still need to make and begin writing.

Part A: Pre-Writing for Pacing and Organization (W.6.3b, W.6.3d) (15 minutes)

Say: In our Launch, we discussed how pacing, the speed at which a story unfolds, can create suspense or emphasize a character’s reflections. Now, you will formalize those thoughts into a sequence of events, similar to the model we explored in the Literacy Lab.

Say these Directions: Begin planning your own narrative by writing a basic sequence of events or information. Keep it simple at first, and focus on how the story will unfold and when the most important information will be revealed.

• [See teacher model from Literacy Lab.]

Instruct students to move on to creating an outline for their own story, just like the one you modeled in the Literacy Lab.

• Say: Turn your sequence into an outline. It’s OK if yours is only two parts. Be clear about how information and events are organized. Make sure you also begin to add some of the sensory details you will include in your paragraph.

  • [See teacher model from Literacy Lab.]

Part B: Narrative Writing (W.6.3b, W.6.3d) (15 minutes)

Remind students of the importance of using what they know about their characters from the anchor text to inform their writing. Include an example of nonstandard English dialogue from the text to show how to get a sense of how characters talk and be true to it. Say these Directions: Now begin drafting your narrative paragraph using your outline as a guide. As you write, make choices that stay true to your character, develop the pacing clearly, and help readers understand the character’s experience.

• Say: Remember to use what you know about your character from the book so that they will be recognizable to the reader.

• Say: Think carefully about how your character would speak, think, and notice details. Use dialogue, description, and pacing in ways that fit the character and make the scene feel believable.

Instruct students to begin writing their paragraphs. A scoring rubric is included for reference.

• Today started like a normal day in gym class. Kenzi was choking on the smell of sweaty bodies and way too much body spray. When the gym teacher blew her whistle, Kenzi jumped because it was so loud. She had a big announcement. “Today is the big physical fitness test!” All the color left Kenzi’s face at once. His heart started to beat like a hummingbird’s wings. His palms and his face were suddenly all wet from sweat. For a long time, he had been working every day to get ready for this test. Now, he could barely run a few feet without getting tired. Kenzi remembered those training sessions like they were yesterday. “You got this!” his brother shouted as he ran faster and faster. “You a tough kid.” Kenzi didn’t feel so tough without his brother. He still remembered the day his brother went away. He missed him like as much now as he did then. But today, he was going to run as fast as he could, just to make his brother proud.

Lesson 31 Writing Rubric: Narrative Paragraph — Pacing and Structure

Writing prompt: Plan and begin writing an original narrative story based on a character from Look Both Ways. Establish your narrator, setting, and central moment, then use intentional pacing — slowing down what matters and moving quickly through what doesn’t. — slowing down a key moment with detail, speeding through background — to shape how the reader experiences the story.

Think-Pair-Share

Instruct students to do a Think-Pair-Share routine based on the following prompt.

• Say: Think of one technique you used in your writing and the effect you hope it will have on your readers. Then discuss it with a partner.

• Optional Sentence Starter:

  • “One technique I used was ____. I hope this will help the reader ____.”

    • One technique I used was dialogue to help the character feel more authentic. I hope this will help the reader connect with my character.

Provide students with a copy of “Thank You, M’am”. Read the first paragraph out loud, and ask students to predict what will happen to each character.

Instruct students to read the rest of their story and answer the following question in their Journal:

• How do the characters in “Thank You, M’am” create empathy?