ALEX Learning Activity

This learning activity should be used as an explore/explain activity for students to apply their narrative writing skills and practice differentiating between narrative and expository writing.  The students will practice these skills through correspondence with a publisher and by writing a narrative of a single scene from a hero's journey.  By including the correspondence aspect of the activity, students will be able to show their ability to differentiate between narrative and expository writing.  By limiting the students to writing a single narrative scene, they will be able to more easily demonstrate their ability to write narratives that show not tell.  This should combat some of the summaries that often results when students try to tell an entire story.  Students will need to have prior knowledge concerning the difference between narrative and expository writing and the difference between a single scene in a story and an entire story.  They will also need to be familiar with the basic concepts of letter writing, the hero's journey motif, and the choices authors must make in terms of point of view, showing not telling, and dialogue.  Finally, the students will be presented with My Hero's Journey Narrative Correspondence, a letter between the students and an editor from a publishing company interested in publishing their work. The students will write a single-scene narrative with a clear beginning, middle, and end using a consistent point of view that paints a picture of the characters, setting, and events of the story.  The students will use action verbs, imagery, dialogue, and figurative language to paint this picture.  During the activity the students will use a My Hero's Journey Peer Review; revise, edit, and publish their writing to a class Padlet page; and write a letter to their publisher concerning the status of their work.

This activity was created as a result of the ALEX Resource Development Summit.

I will write a single scene narrative from an imagined hero's story using dialogue, pacing, description, and reflection, to develop experiences, events, and/or characters.

I will write both a letter and a narrative to show that I can produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.

I will use the writing process to complete my letter and narrative, with some guidance and support from peers and adults, to show that I can develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach.

The teacher will share My Hero's Journey Narrative Correspondence from the publishing editor.  Once the students have had the opportunity to read the letter and its attachment (My Hero’s Journey Narrative Rubric), the teacher will ask questions to ensure the students understand what they will need to do to be successful with the activity.

The students will use My Hero's Journey Narrative Correspondence to write their narratives independently.

The students will work with a partner to complete My Hero's Journey Peer Review of their work.

The student will write a business letter response to his/her editor to share the link to the class Padlet page and request feedback on his/her work. 

The students will use the peer review notes to revise, edit, and publish their narratives to the class Padlet page.

The teacher can assess the students' narrative writing skills and application of the traditional hero's journey patterns and characteristics using the same My Hero’s Journey Narrative Rubric.

The teacher will need to ...

• make a copy of the My Hero's Journey Narrative Correspondence from the editor and personalize it before sharing it with the students.  (To personalize the letter, the teacher will need to replace the highlighted questions with his/her name and that of the school.)
• provide the students with copies of the My Hero's Journey Peer Review.
• determine how the students will be grouped for the peer review activity.
• make sure students are familiar with the expectations and models of good narrative writing before beginning this learning activity.

The teacher may need to ...

• Depending on the students' ability levels, the teacher may want to have the students annotate the letter from the editor and the rubric to demonstrate their understanding of the activity's expectations instead of using a question and answer session to assess this before the activity begins.
• Depending on the students' previous experiences, they may or may not need a model of a business letter or a business letter template before writing their responses to their editor.
• The teacher may want to strategically partner students for the peer review activity or use groups of three where two students work together to review another's work.
• The teacher may want to create a fake email account for students to respond to the editor in an email using the business letter format to also address email etiquette in the activity and give the activity a more real-world experience.

Although this learning activity is designed to give students an opportunity to demonstrate their understanding of the traditional hero's journey patterns and characteristics, it could easily be modified to use with any narrative writing activity. 

As students will finish this activity at different times, the teacher may want to share the Giraffe Heroes Project with early finishers to let them explore stories about real-life heroes to share with the class at another time.

The teacher may need to conference with the student(s) concerning the peer review - may be done one-on-one or with both partners.

Padlet is a collaborative tool that allows students to share their work, images, videos, etc. with others.  It can be set up using a private link so that only those with the link can view or access it. (Padlet Tutorial if needed.)

This learning activity could be taught with

• What Makes a Hero?
• My Hero's Journey Book Proposal
• Narrative Writing Revision Boot Camp