The Personal Narrative Speech

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The Personal Narrative Speech 

• The Personal Narrative Speech and Essay are all
  about you!

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The Personal Narrative Speech

• The main point is that you are talking about
  yourself, your thoughts, your feelings, your
  ideas, your views, your opinions, and your
  events.
• All of these ideas are the main components of
  this special speech writing process.

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The Personal Narrative Speech

• To create a personal narrative, explore each of
  these personal ideas, and then choose one to
  narrow down so you can build a speech.
• The goal of the personal narrative is also to
  make a point about
• a personal past or present experience,
• event,
• knowledge,
• or moral lesson.

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The following is a list of narrative speech
topic ideas  

• ABOUT EVENTS
• An accident or positive event that changed my
  life.
• The birth of my brother, sister or other
  relative.
• My first day at High School or College.
• The decision I regret most.
• My Day of Graduation.
• My first serious date.

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• More events
• A significant family event.
• A memorable vacation.
• A historical event that impressed me.
• The day I moved.
• A milestone that seemed bad but turned out to be
  good.
• My heroic sports moment.

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• ABOUT YOUR LIFE LESSONS
• The influence of a special person on my behavior.
• How I have dealt with a difficult situation.
• What lessons I have learned through studying the
  genealogy of my family.
• A prejudice that involved me.
• A Eureka moment I suddenly understood how
  something works in life that I had been
  struggling with.
• How I helped someone else and what I learned from
  her or him, and from the situation.

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• ABOUT YOUR EXPERIENCES
• My most frustrating moment.
• How I handled an emergency situation.
• How I broke up with my love.
• A narrow escape.
• A moment when I did something that took a lot of
  courage.

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• More personal experience ideas
• A time when I chose to go my own way and did not
  follow the crowd.
• How I stood up for my beliefs.
• The day I rebelled with a decision concerning me.
• How I have coped with my nerves recently.
• What happened when I had a disagreement with my
  parent/teacher/employer

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• ABOUT YOUR RITUALS
• How I usually prepare for a test.
• My ritual before a sports game.
• My ritual before going out with friends.
• The routines I always follow under certain
  circumstances.

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• ABOUT YOUR IDENTITY
• My act of heroism.
• How curiosity brings me where I am now.
• I daydream of ... (keep it clean ?)
• A place that stands for my romantic moments.
• My pet resembles my personal habits.
• A vivid childhood memory in which I can see how I
  would develop myself.

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Once you have chosen an idea, you will need to
narrow the speech topic appropriately.

• Here are some suggestions
• Pick out one significant story about yourself.
  Dont try to tell your life storynarrow your
  topic down.
• Then, think about the point you want to make and
  the response you want to get from your audience.
  What do you want them to remember? What is the
  purpose, point, goal, lesson, or plot of your
  story? Why might your audience think your
  presentation is valuable or important?
• Think about your narrative just like a short
  story and include all of the story elements the
  main event, the characters, the relevant details,
  the steps and/or dialogue.
• Organize the text of the speech in a time ordered
  format. The chronological order also helps you
  to remember your key ideas better.

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• More suggestions for narrowing your topic
• Avoid starting your speech with an explanation of
  what you learned from this event use the
  chronological order strategy to build up to the
  resolution where you can explain the life lesson
  this experience taught you.
• Add transitions words like then, after that,
  next, at this moment.
• Rehearse!!! Rehearse your narrative in front of
  a friend and ask opinions. Then practice
  again!!!
• Avoid memorizing or reading your speech. Your
  audience will enjoy your narrative so much better
  if you sound like you are just talking to them.
• Be sure to try and make eye contact with your
  listeners.

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Structuring the Narrative Speech

• To develop a thesis, ask yourself these
  questions
• What is the main point I want to make to my
  audience?
• Do I want them to identify me as a caring
  individual?
• Do I want them to think Im smart so Ill tell
  them about the honors I won last year?
• How can I present my topic so that it
  accomplishes my purpose?  How would I go about
  doing that?

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Use the elements of a short story to construct
the Personal Narrative Speech

• Create a Catchy introduction
• Establish the exposition
• Characters and relationships
• Physical descriptions
• Dialogue
• Setting
• Time period
• Develop the Rising Action
• Introduce a conflict(s)
• Build to a climactic moment
• Develop the Falling Action
• The events in the story that lead to the ending
  of the story
• Create the denouement, or the resolution/conclusio
  n
• Review what has happened in the story
• Show the resolutionwhat happens as a result of
  your story.
• Emphasize the lesson learned

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The Personal Narrative Speech 

• The Personal Narrative Speech and Essay are all
  about you!