Congratulations on your top-scoring essay. To add polish to your writing skills for the biographical narrative, try the following activities:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Identify two ways in which your essay and the model essay differ. What can you learn from these differences that will make you a better writer of this kind of essay?
• Create your own model essay. (Any time during this activity that you need an example, remember to consult the model essay.)

1. Consider other ways to open your essay. Remember that the opening lines should get your reader’s attention. Sometimes a simple, direct, even blunt statement will do the trick. Or you might want to begin with a thought-provoking question, a vividly described scene, or a forceful anecdote.
2. The prompt for a biographical narrative usually requires that the essay focus on a particular aspect of the subject’s life or on a particular idea about the subject’s life. This focus gives the essay a controlling idea. Check your opening paragraph to make sure it includes an explicit statement of your controlling idea.
3. With a narrative of this kind, it’s a good idea to select a small number of important events or stages in the life of your subject and then develop each of these events or stages into a well-developed paragraph that relates to your controlling idea. Check each body paragraph. Make sure each one clearly develops your controlling idea.
4. Check for narrative transitions–words or phrases that smoothly link the events in your essay. Words such as next, then, and finally can help readers to follow the narrative flow.
5. Re-read your conclusion. Make sure that it returns to your controlling idea and leaves your reader with something to ponder as well.
6. Give your essay an eye-catching title.
7. Add annotations to your essay. Label the controlling idea, each key part of the narrative, and supporting incidents and details. Then, share your essay with a small group of classmates. Your annotations can help guide a discussion of your own model essay.

For an essay scoring 5

Congratulations on a job well done. To become an even better writer of the biographical narrative, try the following activities:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Identify two ways in which your essay and the model essay differ. What can you learn from these differences that will make you a better writer of this kind of essay?

• Examine your controlling idea. (Any time during this activity that you need an example, remember to consult the model essay.) The prompt for a biographical narrative will likely require you to focus on a single idea about the person you choose as the subject of your essay. This focus gives your essay a controlling idea.

1. Read the prompt for this essay closely. What idea about your subject’s life does it ask you to develop in your essay? Your answer is this essay’s controlling idea.
2. Read each body paragraph in your essay. Highlight evidence that supports your controlling idea. Mark through any parts of your essay that do not support your controlling idea. Make notes about evidence you could add to body paragraphs to help support your controlling idea.
3. Using the work you completed for step 2 above, revise your essay.

For an essay scoring 4

Congratulations. You’ve written a successful biographical narrative. But since there’s always room for improvement, try the following activities to strengthen your writing:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Identify two ways in which your essay and the model essay differ. What can you learn from these differences that will make you a better writer of this kind of essay?

• Try a peer interview to develop your essay even more. (Any time during this activity that you need an example, remember to consult the model essay.)

1. Read your essay aloud to a classmate.
2. As you finish reading each body paragraph, stop and ask your partner to interview you about the contents of the paragraph. Your partner’s task is to find out more about your subject by asking questions. Your job is to answer each question as thoroughly as possible. Before you proceed to the next paragraph of your essay, jot down a few notes to remind you of what you’ve added to your topic during the interview.
3. Using your notes from the interview, revise your essay.

For an essay scoring 3

Your score on this essay shows some success with the biographical narrative. What can you do to get better at this kind of writing? Try the following activities:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Identify two ways in which your essay and the model essay differ. What can you learn from these differences that will make you a better writer of this kind of essay?
• Focus on development. (Any time during this activity that you need an example, remember to consult the model essay.) The prompt for a biographical narrative will likely require you to focus on a single idea about the person you choose as the subject of your essay. This focus gives your essay a controlling idea.

1. Your prompt is at the top of this window. Read it closely. What idea about your person’s life does it ask you to develop in your essay? Write your answer at the top of a fresh sheet of paper; it will serve as your controlling idea.
2. Next, brainstorm a list of events in your person’s life that would make your controlling idea come to life.
3. Often, the events on a biographical brainstorm can be grouped into the stages of the person’s life–for example, childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood. Try to combine the events on your brainstormed list into three or four groups.
4. Next, arrange the groups in chronological order.
5. Use the grouped events from step 4 above to re-write the body paragraphs for your essay.

For an essay scoring 2

Your score on this essay shows a need for further practice with the biographical narrative. What can you do to learn more about this kind of writing? Try the following activities:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Identify two ways in which your essay and the model essay differ. What can you learn from these differences that will make you a better writer of this kind of essay?
• Revise one step. (Any time during this activity that you need an example, remember to consult the model essay.) The prompt for a biographical narrative will likely require you to focus on a single idea about the person you choose as the subject of your essay. This focus gives your essay a controlling idea.

1. Your prompt is at the top of this window. Read it closely. What idea about your person’s life does it ask you to develop in your essay? Write your answer at the top of a fresh sheet of paper; it will serve as your controlling idea.
2. Think about the person you chose to write about for this prompt. Which part of this person’s life would best help to make your controlling idea come to life? Write your answer beneath what your wrote for step 1 above.
3. Next, write a paragraph about the part of your person’s life you identified in step 2 above. Use as many incidents and details as you can remember from this part of your person’s life, and be sure to explain how this part of your person’s life shows the controlling idea you wrote down for step 1.
4. Revise your essay, using the same care and attention for each body paragraph.

For an essay scoring 1

Your score on this essay shows a need for further practice with the biographical narrative. What can you do to learn more about this kind of writing? Try the following activities:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Identify two ways in which your essay and the model essay differ. What can you learn from these differences that will make you a better writer of this kind of essay?

• Consider the possibilities. (Any time during this activity that you need an example, remember to consult the model essay.) The prompt for a biographical narrative will likely require you to focus on a single idea about the person you choose as the subject of your essay. However, this kind of prompt does not tell you which person to write about in your essay.

1. Working with a partner, brainstorm a list of people that could be used to answer the prompt.
2. Select one of the people from your list. Make a list of all the things you know about this person that could answer the question in the prompt.
3. Consider writing a new essay for the prompt. And the next time you encounter a prompt which allows you this kind of choice, brainstorm several possibilities before you begin writing. Then choose the best one–you’ll write a better essay.

For an Unscorable essay

Your essay has not been scored. The most common reason for this problem is that the essay doesn’t focus on the assigned topic or doesn’t use the assigned approach to the topic. To improve your ability to interpret a biographical narrative prompt and to write a biographical narrative, try one of the following activities:

• Click on the Model Essay link, and read the model essay closely. Compare it to your own essay. Notice how the model essay focuses on the assigned topic. Notice that the model essay tells a story and uses the story to explain something important about the subject–as the prompt states.

• Analyze your prompt.

1. Your prompt is at the top of this window. Print this window, and read your prompt closely. What idea about a person does it ask you to focus on? Read the prompt again, and highlight this idea.
2. Using your own words, write the controlling idea on a fresh sheet of paper.
3. Beneath the controlling idea you wrote for step 2, list people that go with the controlling idea. If the prompt requires you to choose from particular categories of people, be sure not to list anyone who doesn’t fall into these categories.
4. Circle the person on your list that you know the most about, and you will be ready to write a more successful biographical narrative.