A Story Frames Plot Analysis of UNBREAKABLE

 

In last week's BLOG, I recommended using the picture book Unbreakable: A Japanese American Family in an American Incarceration Camp to bridge the gap between narrative and non-fiction by exploring its rich back matter.  This week, I'll give a brief summary of the book using Storyboard elements from my book, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy. For more information about Story Frames, go HERE or visit Brookes Publishing.

Read the book to your students before discussing the plot and have them take notes or make quick sketches about what is happening in the story. Even older students enjoy listening to stories, and using sketches is a great way to introduce struggling writers to note-taking. In Chapter 6 of Story Frames, "From Speaking to Writing: Sentences, Paragraphs, and Stories," I share a Quick Draw strategy based upon Ukrainetz's 1998 method for "picture noting." Basically, students listen to a story and draw sketches of what is happening in the plot. For Story Frames, we then use those sketches to fill out a storyboard and discuss plot elements. The storyboard can then be used to retell the story orally or to write a summary. Ukrainetz later adapted her strategy to note-taking for non-fiction. 

Ukrainetz, T. (1998). Stickwriting stories: A quick and easy narrative representation strategy. Language, Speech, and Hearing in Schools, 29, 197-206. 

Ukrainetz, T. A. (2019). Sketch and speak: An expository intervention using note-taking and oral practice for children with language-related learning disabilities. Language, Speech, and Hearing in Schools, 50, 53-70.  

Unbreakable Plot Summary
BEGINNING:
1. Ordinary World - Min and his family live in San Pedro, California, where his father sells fruits and vegetables. Min enjoys collecting rocks as he walks home from school. 
2. Call and Response - FBI agents come to the home and accuse Mr. Tonai of being a spy because he gave money to family members in Japan.
3. Mentors, Guides, and Gifts - In December of 1941, agents return and take Mr. Tonai away. Before he leaves, he gives Min a smooth gray stone "for strength."
4. Crossing - People of Japanese descent are forced to leave their homes. Min, his mother, and siblings are taken to Santa Anita Park.
MIDDLE: 
5. New World - Their new home is a horse stall at the racetrack with straw mattresses.
6. Problems, Prizes, and Plans - Guards patrol the racetrack, and no one is able to leave. 
7. Midpoint Attempt - The family is hopeful when they are told they are being moved to Granada, Colorado, but Camp Amache turns out to be a dry desert. Min makes furniture from scrap wood to lift his mother's spirits. They receive letters from Mr. Tonai, who is imprisoned elsewhere. Min clutches the stone and thinks of his father.
8. Chase and Escape - In March of 1944, Min sees a man outside the barracks and runs to greet him. It's his father who has joined them at Amache. He has been released from prison.
END:
9. Downtime - Mr. Tonai has collected stones from every prison where he was incarcerated. He shows them to Min and talks about the strength and beauty he has found. 
10. Death and Transformation - They use the rock collection to create a beautiful design outside of their barracks. They have transformed something ugly into something beautiful.
11. Climax: The Final Test - In October of 1945, the Tonai family is finally released from the camp. At first, Min worries that they won't be accepted or that they could be incarcerated again. Min lets go of the stone and holds his parents' hands "for strength," knowing that they will make things better. 
12. Final Reward - (In the co-author's note) As an adult, Min founded the Amache Historical Society. In 2015, Emperor Akihito awarded Min with a medal for "promoting friendly relations and mutual understanding between Japan and the United States."

A Different Kind of Hero's Journey

My Story Frames analysis is based on The Hero's Journey, as described by Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces. In Western culture, we are accustomed to Hero stories where an underdog fights against extreme odds to emerge victorious over a bigger, stronger opponent, but that's not how real life works for most of us. Sometimes heroes make their mark by enduring extreme hardship through resourcefulness (making furniture from scraps) and by creating beauty in the midst of adversity (crafting art from stones). They try to create a better world in ways both big and small. That is the story of Min Tonai, and it is inspiring because these are things each of us can do every day - create beauty and hope wherever we find ourselves.

Next week, we will use Unbreakable to explore the difference between phrases and clauses.

RELATED POSTS

Happy Book Birthday to UNBREAKABLE

Sign up HERE to receive my newsletter with FREE activities based on Story Frames and my decodable books. 

A STORY FRAMES ANALYSIS OF HAPPY SONGKRAN DAY

 

In last week's BLOG, I recommended using Dow Phumiruk's picture book, Happy Songkran Day! The Thai New Year Celebration to celebrate culture and diversity. It may be used for all ages to explore the Thai New Year celebrated from April 13-15. Read last week's blog post to learn more about how to use the book in the classroom. This week, I'll give a brief summary of the book using Storyboard elements from my book, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy. For more information about Story Frames, go HERE or visit Brookes Publishing.

BEGINNING:

1. Ordinary World - Tida is a sweet young girl who lives with her parents and her sister, Lek. She gets a little clumsy when she is excited.

2. Call and Response - Tida wakes up her sister, Lek, on April 13, to celebrate the beginning of the Thai New Year. 

3. Mentors, Guides, and Gifts - Tida's mother teaches her the true meaning of the Thai cleaning rituals as the story progresses.

4. Crossing - The family cleans their hands in jasmine water to wash away the sins of the old year in preparation for the new one. 

MIDDLE:

5. New World - They go to the temple to pour water on the Buddha statue.

6. Problems, Prizes, and Plans - The family prepares special foods like satay with peanut sauce for the celebration. The prize is the big dance that evening, where Lek will perform with other children. Tida makes a lot of mistakes while cooking because she gets excited and rushes through things. 

7. Midpoint Attempt - Tek returns from dance rehearsal and shows the family her special dress made for the occasion. Tida wants to show off her work and accidentally spills peanut sauce on Tek's sash. 

8. Chase and Escape - Tida runs to her room in shame.

END:

9. Downtime - Her mother sits with Tida and explains that everyone makes mistakes. The point of the cleansing celebration is to wash away mistakes and start each year anew.

10. Death and Transformation - Tida and her mother wash the sash and make it good as new.

11. Climax: The Final Test - Tida apologizes to Tek for having so many accidents. Her sister tells her that the New Year is a time for forgiveness.

12. Final Reward - Family and friends celebrate the new year with water balloons, squirt guns, and buckets of water, all symbols of cleansing. Tek's dance performance is a great success, and at a big dinner that night, Tida is proud that she does not spill anything.

RELATED POSTS

Celebrating Thai Culture and Diversity with Happy Songkran Day

Simple Sentences Aren't So Simple

Complex Sentences Made Simple

Read more about Story Frames for Teaching Literacy HERE. Sign up HERE to receive my newsletter with FREE activities based on Story Frames and my decodable books. This month, newsletter recipients will receive my FREE activity Story Ad Lib #2: A Special Celebration.

THE SECRET LANGUAGE OF STORIES

I have given several presentations and workshops over the years on "The Secret Language of Stories," exploring the plotting secrets of professional writers. In addition to working in the public schools as a speech-language pathologist and as a private dyslexia therapist, I have published three young adult novels. (Find out more about my novels HERE.)

In 2021, I combined my love of writing with my experiences working with struggling readers and writers to create Story Frames: Enhancing Student Learning Through the Power of Storytelling. It is a twelve-step story analysis I created that is inspired by The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers by Christopher Vogler and various other books on story plotting for professional writers (See my blog post about How Screenwriting and Novel Writing Strategies Influenced Story Frames). I use the Story Frames method to create my novels and teach writing to kids of all ages and adults. I teach students storyboarding and a strategy called Pictography to capture important plot points through quick sketches. 

My method is broken down into twelve basic elements or Story Frames. Stories don’t necessarily contain all of the components, and they don’t always occur in the order given here. In longer stories, many of the elements are repeated. The twelve basic elements for the COMPLETE Storyboard are below:

BEGINNING:

1. Ordinary World

2. Call and Response

3. Mentors, Guides, and Gifts

4. Crossing

MIDDLE:

5. New World

6. Problems, Prizes, and Plans

7. Midpoint Attempt

8. Downtime

END:

9. Chase and Escape

10. Death and Transformation

11. Climax: The Final Test

12. Final Reward

For younger students or when analyzing simpler stories, I use a BASIC storyboard containing eight elements:

1. Ordinary World

2. Call and Response

3. Problem and Prize

4. Plan

5. Attempt 1

6. Attempt 2

7. Climax - The Final Test

8. Reward

This year, my blog posts will focus on sharing a variety of children's books that I have analyzed using this structure.  I'm always looking for ways to make the writing process fun and engaging. Chapter 6 of my Story Frames book focuses on "From Speaking to Writing: Sentences, Paragraphs, and Stories." One of the many downloadable resources from that chapter is a Story Ad Lib. It's a fun, fill-in-the-blank story writing activity similar to commercial Mad Lib games. My version gives students a fun way to practice working with narrative structure. This year, I will be giving away several PDF activities in my monthly newsletter based on Story Ad Libs. The first will come out on February 27, 2026. Sign up HERE if you would like to receive my newsletter and receive those free PDFs.

Go to Brooke's Publishing for more information about Story Frames.

Q & A With Brookes Publishing

Read my recent Q & A with Brookes Publishing where I discuss my new book.

Q. Your book explores the ways in which analyzing and creating stories can improve literacy and learning skills for all students. How does the process of mastering storytelling help boost those critical skills?

A. As a speech-language pathologist, anytime I evaluate a student’s receptive and expressive language I look at how they express themselves in connected discourse. Retelling a story is often part of that process. The ability to retell a story or create an original narrative are important skills for both school and life. Standardized tests have even been created to measure these abilities, and I discuss some of these tests in my book.

Understanding story structure gives kids a framework to organize a narrative that helps them determine which details to prioritize so they can recall those details, sequence information, make meaning out of new words and concepts, and learn to self-question to assess their own comprehension.

Stories are part of our daily lives. Families members tell stories to connect with each other, share their history, and to inform. Peers share stories to build relationships. Educators use stories to teach. Marketers use stories to persuade. Lawyers use stories to prove guilt or innocence. Detectives interview witnesses and use their stories to solve crimes. Stories help us to take the perspective of others, organize the events of our life, and make meaning from chaos.

I have found that struggling learners typically have two approaches to retelling a story. Either they have no frame of reference for the events, shrug their shoulders and say, “I don’t know,” or else they feel they must start at the beginning and include every single detail they can remember. Both responses stem from not understanding the basic structure of a narrative and what elements are essential to include in a retelling. When a student understands that structure, they then have a framework for organizing all kinds of narratives—those they encounter in school and those they encounter in everyday life. Consider how many core subjects use stories to convey information on topics as diverse as the Revolutionary War to space flight...

For the rest of the Q & A, visit the Brookes website. To receive a code for 20% off of Story Frames in my March and April newsletters and receive a free story template, sign up for my mailing list.

STORY FRAMES COMING SOON

I am excited and delighted to share the cover for my new book, STORY FRAMES FOR TEACHING LITERACY coming out with Brookes Publishing in early April 2021. Many of you have participated in my workshops for Story Frames (formerly The Secret Language of Stories). I have presented these strategies at ASHA, ILA/IRA, and the Annual Reading, Literacy and Learning Conference put on each year by the International Dyslexia Association (IDA), as well as many smaller conferences and workshops. 

If you have used these resources with your students and would like to share your experiences, please contact me at carolee@wordtravelliteracy.com.

Story Frames combines the strategies that teachers and SLPs implement to teach story grammar with the techniques that professional authors use to plot their books. This unique combination helps students appreciate stories at a deeper level and gives them tools for creating their own narratives. 

Here are a few of the features of the book described by the publisher:

"This guidebook reveals how to unlock literacy and learning skills by captivating K–12 students with the power of stories: how they’re structured, how they reflect and change lives, and how students can create their own original narratives. Using dozens of diverse fiction and nonfiction books as vivid examples, you’ll discover how to teach 12 key story elements (Story Frames) in dynamic, fun, and highly visual ways, including Quick Draws, storyboards, and icons that make narrative structure easy to grasp. Then you’ll get in-depth guidance on how to use knowledge of story structure to build core literacy skills—from oral language to reading comprehension—and empower students to write their own personal stories in a variety of genres. The book includes more than 35 adaptable lesson plans and a complete package of online support materials including PowerPoints and other tools for online learning." 

ONLINE MATERIALS: Implement Story Frames effectively with a full package of downloadable materials, including sample storyboards and templates, 40+ handouts and worksheets, game cards, slide decks to use in instruction, 30+ sample story analyses of books for children and young adults, and brief literature guides for applying Story Frames to picture books and to chapter books and novels.

Several noteworthy authors have contributed chapters to Story Frames including:

Amy Miller, Director of the May Center for Learning in Santa Fe, NM shares how students transform personal experiences into superhero stories. She runs a project called the Dyslexia Justice League where she uses superheroes and the Hero's Journey to help students explore personal struggles and develop a growth mindset.

Paula Moraine, educator, consultant, and author of Helping Students Take Control of Everyday Executive Functions provides practical strategies for using narratives as a medium for improving executive function skills.

Mary Jo O'Neill, parent advocate, discusses how getting parents to write down their family stories provides a powerful tool for advocacy. Her chapter highlights a type of persuasive writing that has real-world implications for students receiving special education services. 

Lesley Roessing, university lecturer and author of Bridging the Gap: Reading Critically and Writing Meaningfully to Get to the Core shares insights for teaching memoir writing and explains how memoir can be a bridge to expository writing.

William Van Cleave, educational consultant and author of Writing Matters: Designing Sentence Skills in Students of All Ages, helps educators make sense out of grammar instruction by focusing on function rather than form.

Carol Westby, university lecturer, researcher, author, and leading authority on narrative development, discusses the importance of considering multicultural perspectives in the writing of personal stories and the ways storytelling varies across countries and cultures. Her chapter also discusses strategies for empowering English as a Second Language (ESL) students. She offers several online courses through PESI including Developing Social-Emotional Skills and Self Regulation in Students: Narrative Intervention for Long-Term Academic, Personal & Social Success. 

For a full list of the downloadable resources that accompany my book, find out more at Brookes Publishing.

Sign up for my monthly NEWSLETTER for articles, book news, and FREE offers. Receive a FREE Story Template PDF called Travel Trouble when you sign up.

SCREENWRITING AND NOVEL PLOTTING - THE INSPIRATION BEHIND STORY FRAMES

STORY FRAMES is a twelve-step story analysis method that I created based upon my experiences as both an author of fiction and a speech-language pathologist (SLP) working with struggling students in the public schools in grades K-12. As I observed the difficulties my students faced with reading, writing, and understanding stories, I set out to create a narrative analysis method that would bring stories to life and provide young people with tools to create exciting tales of their own.

Creative writing courses along with numerous books on the subject of story plotting for authors and screenwriters gave me the inspiration to combine the way teachers look at story structure with the way that professional writers plot their stories.  Reading teachers and SLPs frequently use the Story Grammar elements outlined by Stein and Glenn (1979) to teach story structure to students:

    1. Setting

    2. Initiating Event

    3. Internal Response

    4. Attempt

    5. Consequence

    6. Reaction

 English Teachers tend to draw upon tools such as Freytag's Pyramid: 

1. Exposition
2. Rising Action
3. Climax
4. Falling Action
5. Resolution

The STORY FRAMES method is broken down into twelve basic elements or Story Frames based on the Hero's Journey as originally discussed by Joseph Campbell in The Hero With A Thousand Faces and later adapted for screenwriters and novelists by Christopher Vogler in The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers (Now in its 25th year). Other books on story plotting that influenced STORY FRAMES are found at the end of this post. I use the term "Hero's" Journey loosely. Heroes come in all shapes and sizes and their adventures don’t have to be epic odysseys to be life-changing. Stories do not necessarily contain all of the components outlined, and they don’t always occur in the order given below. In longer stories, many of the elements are repeated. The purpose of this analysis is to help students and other writers to recognize what is going on in stories and to begin to think like authors.

The twelve elements of STORY FRAMES include:

BEGINNING

1. Ordinary World

2. Call and Response

3. Mentors, Guides, and Gifts

4. Crossing

MIDDLE

5. New World

6. Problems, Prizes, and Plans

7. Midpoint Attempt

8. Downtime

END

9. Chase and Escape

10. Death and Transformation

11. Climax: The Final Test

12. Final Reward

To find out more about my story analysis method, visit the STORY FRAMES tab on this blog. Check out my fiction novels HERE.

There are many excellent books that have influenced my plotting techniques. For further reading I recommend:

1. The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers by Christopher Vogler
2. Save the Cat: The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need by Blake Snyder
3. Story: Substance, Structure, Style and the Principles of Screenwriting by Robert McKee

4. Inside Story: The Power of the Transformational Arc by Dara Marks

5. First Draft in 30 Days: A Novel Writer's System for Building A Complete and Cohesive Manuscript by         Karen S. Wiesner

To receive a FREE Story Builder Template called Travel Trouble SIGN UP for my monthly newsletter.

Special Announcement: STORY FRAMES Coming October 2020!

I'm excited to announce that Brookes Publishing has offered a contract for my educational book, Story Frames: Using Narratives to Improve Reading Comprehension, Writing, Executive Function Skills and More. Publication is scheduled for October of 2020. Even more exciting, they have agreed to use the illustrations created by my very talented brother, Chris Jochens. Here's a sample of his artwork:

In Story Frames, I combine my understanding of story structure (from my perspective as a young adult author) with my years of experience using narratives with struggling students in the public schools working as a speech-language pathologist. I have been fine-tuning this approach for years. A detailed description of the twelve story elements along with examples of stories I have analyzed using this method may be found on this blog at the tab for  The Secret Language of Stories.

Free activities may be found on my Teachers Pay Teachers Page HERE.

If you want to keep up with news and other free offers, sign up for my free newsletter on my CONTACT PAGE.

Thanks to everyone who has offered support and encouragement for this project. It has been quite a labor of love. I couldn't have done it without you!