Personal Narratives Essays

Multiple Choice

What is another name for a personal narrative essay?

• one day essay

• personal feeling essay

• autobiographical incident

• historical narrative

Multiple Choice

Personal narrative essays feature long spans of times like years or decades of a person's life?

• True

• False

Multiple Select

Which of the following pronouns will you most likely see in first person writing?

• I

• me

• we

• you

Now, read the following selections of essays and explain how they meet the definition of a personal narrative essay.

Multiple Choice

It was a Saturday. Whether it was sunny or cloudy, hot or cold, I cannot remember, but I do remember it was a Saturday because the mall was packed with people.

I was with my mom.

• multiple points of view

• first person narration

• advanced vocabulary

• lengthy time period

Multiple Select

Mom is short. Skinny. It is easy to overlook her in a crowd simply because she is nothing extraordinary to see.

On that day we strolled down the slippery-slick tiles with soft, inconspicuous steps, peeking at window boutiques in fleeting glances because we both knew we wouldn’t be buying much, like always.

I remember I was looking up at the people we passed as we walked — at first apathetically, but then more attentively.

• first person point of view

• descriptive, sensory details

• multiple characters

• a focus on mythology

Multiple Choice

Her clothes were tattered and old because she spent her money buying me new ones. She looked so tired and ragged all the time because she was busy working to provide for me. She didn’t wear jewelry or scented perfumes because she was just content with me.

Suddenly, Mother was beautiful and extraordinarily wonderful in my eyes.

• a lengthy period of time that the story takes place in

• a character who overcomes an obstacle

• advanced vocabulary

• a moral, lesson, or realization at the end of the narrative