Narrative Essay Structure

1. Five Elements: • Setting: Location where the action happens • Mood: The feelng/atmosphere that the writer creates. Could be happy, hopeful, suspenseful, scary. Setting and descriptive vocab create the mood • Characters: People in the story. Are affected by the mood and react to the events that they are involved in. • Plot: What happens in the story, the sequence of events. Often includes a climax or turning point at which the characters or events change • Theme: The basic idea. Often, it will deal with a topic that is common in life or human natures, such as greed, envy, love, independence, etc. 2. Introduction • Describe the setting, introduce characters, prepare the reader for the action to come • A hook: i. Grabs the readers' attention ii. Especially important in narrative essays as they help "set the stage" for the story iii. Should make the reader ask Wh- questions (Who, Where, What, Why) • and a thesis : i. a theory/assumption which will be solved later on in the essay ii. States the main idea of the essay and tells what the organization for the information will be iii. In narrative essays, it introduces the action that begins in the first paragraph of the essay, but does not tell the readers what happens, which allows the story to be developed in the paragraphs in the body 3. Verb Tense • Most narrative essays are written in the simple past tense because narratives usually tell storied that have already happened 4. Body • Contains most of the plot - the supporting information. The action in the plot can be organised in many different ways. One way is chronological, or time, order. • Add supporting information • Sentence Variety with time words: • The smaller the action or event you choose, the easier it will be to keep your readers' interest and describe the action fully 5. Conclusion • What will happen last in your story? How will you finish the plot? Will your narrative essay have a moral/make or prediction or a revelation? 6. Choosing a topic: • When write the essay, the smaller the action or event you choose, the easier it will be to keep your readers' interest and describe the action fully.