Page 79 - SpringBoard_Writing_Workshop_Grade6_Flipbook

Writing Workshop 7 (continued)
My Notes
During Reading
3. Good storytelling engages the audience by presenting vivid settings, interesting characters, and carefully developed events. As you read the sample below, look for elements of a good narrative. Mark the text by putting a checkmark in the margin when you find the element, and write the name of the element beside the checkmark.
SAMPLE TEXT
In January of 1980 I was running a seventy-five-mile line, trapping beaver. I had previously trapped with a friend, but this year I was trapping alone, not the wisest thing to do, since there is some risk from bad ice or injuries and it’s better to have a companion. I was alone when I made a mistake that nearly killed me.
The ice around beaver lodges is very dangerous. Beavers live in their lodges and come out of underwater tunnels to get food they have stored at the bottom of the river or pond through the summer, in the form of branches stuck down in the mud. Each time they come out they let air out of their noses and it goes up to make bubbles under the surface of the ice, and this, along with the beavers’ rubbing their backs on the underside of the ice, keeps the ice very thin near a beaver lodge. It can be fifty below with two-foot-thick ice around the whole lake and the ice near the lodge might be less than a quarter inch thick.
I had parked the sled near a lodge and unpacked the gear needed to set a group of snares. Cookie was leading the work team of five dogs and they knew the procedure completely by this time. As soon as I stopped the sled and began to unpack they all lay down, curled their tails over their noses and went to sleep. The process could take two or three hours and they used the time to get rest.
A rope tied the cargo to the sled. I threw the rope across the ice to get it out of the way. One end was still tied to the sled. I took a step on the ice near the rope and went through and down like a stone.
You think there is time to react, that the ice will give way slowly and you’ll be able to hang on to the edge, somehow able to struggle to safety. It’s not that way at all. It’s as if you were suddenly standing on air. The bottom drops out and you go down.
I was wearing heavy clothing and a parka. It gathered water like a sponge and took me down faster.
Two things saved me. One, as I went down my hand fell across the rope I had thrown across the ice, which was still tied to the sled.
Two, as I dropped I had time to yell—scream—and the last thing I saw as I went under was Cookie’s head swinging up from sleeping and her eyes locking on mine as I went beneath the surface.
The truth is I shouldn’t have lived. I have had several friends killed in just this manner—dropping through the ice while running dogs—and there wasn’t much of a chance for me. The water was ten or twelve feet deep. I saw all the bubbles from my clothing going up to the surface and I tried to pull myself up on the rope. My hands slipped and I thought in a wild, mental scream of panic that this was how it would end.
from
My Life in Dog Years by Gary Paulsen
2 SpringBoard® Writing Workshop with Grammar Activities Grade 6
© 2017 College Board. All rights reserved.