English Language Arts Grade 8
Educational Links

Writing Standard 3

Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.

• Choose Your Own Adventure: Hypertext Writing Exp.
  This lesson, from ReadWriteThink, combines reading and writing in a collaborative, small-group learning experience. It utilizes technology, specifically Web page design, group and individual work, and student self-assessment. After reading several examples, students will plan their own adventure story. They will be divided into smaller groups for each split in the story until finally the students are writing their own endings. Using Web-authoring software, groups will create their own Web sites with the parts of the story hyperlinked to each other.
• Eighth Grade On-Demand Narrative Writing Samples
  Sample narrative pieces written by eighth graders in response to a uniform text-based prompt.
• Eighth Grade Range of Writing Narrative Writing Samples
  These pieces provide examples of narrative writing for a range of discipline-specific tasks, purposes, and audiences, over both extended and shorter time frames.
• Poems that Tell a Story
  In this lesson, students read, discuss, and analyze selected poems by Robert Frost. The activities that make up this lesson encourage students to draw inferences about a poem's speaker based on evidence contained within the poem and to gather evidence supporting those inferences. From this page, teachers can access all materials needed to complete the lesson.
• The Big Bad Wolf: Analyzing Point of View in Texts
  Many students read without questioning a text or analyzing the author's viewpoint. In this lesson from ReadWriteThink, students learn to look at texts from different viewpoints. Was the "big bad wolf" really bad? Throughout the lesson, students are encouraged to view texts from different angles.
• The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
  Washington Irving's tale of the Headless Horseman has become a Halloween classic, although few Americans celebrated that holiday when the story was new. In this unit from EDSITEment, students explore the artistry that helped make Irving our nation's first literary master and ponder the mystery that now haunts every Halloween--What happened to Ichabod Crane?
• Writing a Flashback and Flash-Forward Story
  Flashbacks and flash-forwards are common devices used in literature and films. In this lesson from ReadWritethink, students are introduced to examples of these devices through the film "The Sandlot" and/or illustrated books. Students are then asked to create a story that contains both flashback and flash-forward.

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http://www.uen.org - in partnership with Utah State Board of Education (USBE) and Utah System of Higher Education (USHE).  Send questions or comments to USBE Specialist - Naomi  Watkins and see the Language Arts - Secondary website. For general questions about Utah's Core Standards contact the Director - Jennifer  Throndsen.

These materials have been produced by and for the teachers of the State of Utah. Copies of these materials may be freely reproduced for teacher and classroom use. When distributing these materials, credit should be given to Utah State Board of Education. These materials may not be published, in whole or part, or in any other format, without the written permission of the Utah State Board of Education, 250 East 500 South, PO Box 144200, Salt Lake City, Utah 84114-4200.