Here are 3 examples (plus a bonus 4th) of personal narratives. Remember that this is the rubric that we use to guide our writing.
Example 1 of 3 Scroll down for more examples
Dignity & Family
“Are we there yet?” I moan, thinking longingly of running through the fields, feeling the wind against my skin. I shifted in the car seat, listening to the quiet purr of the engine. I try to stretch my stiff, and sore muscles. Man, sitting down for so long can really affect your mood. Pablo snoozed against the window. That would have been me, but I had fought against my heavy eyelids, eager to get out of the car. I pouted—I was only five,—and stared glumly out the window.
“Just hold on,” Mom says from the front as the car veered right. Suddenly, the background becomes familiar. We whizz through the familiar crops, the small, vulnerable rice plants, the tall majestic corn. Oh! And the banana trees! They stand proudly, bearing their golden fruit. Their leaves wave in the wind, like a gentle hand beckoning us back. The grains of rice grow like tiny diamonds, the corn’s teeth like golden coins.
The generations of dust and soil that covered the track clings to our windows like a drowning man might cling to his salvation. Soon, our windows, and pretty much everything in particular is filled with the dry, dead dust.
Great expanses of land and farm are seen in every direction. Near the rice farms the workers walk under the great burning blanket the sun throws at them. They cultivate the grains in bags, which they would probably sell later on. The corn plants grow so high it is impossible for them not to touch the sky.
An old wagon led by a donkey passes by us. I turn to see it continue through the road. It is an old, creaky thing, made of nailed pieces of wood. A family sits on top. They wear colorful clothes. I always wondered why they did. I’d guess it reflected they’re cheerful moods. A handful of corn plants lays strewn across the floor next to them.
As we continue through the fields, they start to thin out, more space is left between them. Then, we leave them behind all together. The dirt road curves around a large wall, its bricks faded and covered with dirt. The top covered with thorns grown by my grandpa himself. The wall finally showed a green iron door. Dad got out of the car and rang the doorbell.
—^—
“¿Hola como estas?” Grandpa asks me, “How are you?” He greets us as we haul our luggage out of the car.
I had missed tata, so much. Man, when was the last time I’d seen him?
“Hola tata,” my brother is finally awake, “hello.” Tata laughs, hugging Pablo.
“Where’s the magic frog?” I ask, not bothering to hide my impatience. I’m no biggie in hugging and stuff.
Now, before you read too much, I’m going to repeat this one more time. I. AM. ONLY. FIVE. Got that? Good, so now you’ve really got no reason to judge me. Right? Right. Okay. Here we go.
“Ah! The legendary frog! Don’t worry, I’ll show it to you soon enough.” He chuckles. “But first let me show you your rooms.”
—^—
“Pablo! Come! Te juego chapadas!” I call my brother. We had spent two days in la chacra. We had gone to feed the carneros, ridden los tractores, and moaned pitifully at not being able to reach las moras. As we energetically start playing tag, Tata comes up.
“Pablo, ¿Por qué no te vas a la cocina? ¡Hay uvas!” Tata suggests. Pablo smiles and runs towards the kitchen. Before I start, Tata says, “Now, do you still want to meet the magic frog?” I hadn’t thought of that since I had gotten out of the car, but as soon as he mentions it, all thoughts of tag quickly leave my mind.
“Come,” Tata says ushering me towards the pool. Over it stands a stone frog, like a king protecting his kingdom. It bares his chest proudly and sits with his head held high. The mouth is delicately made, and a gaping hole is carved in the middle of it. “So here’s the thing about magic,” He says, “To make the frog work, you have to kiss him. You will make him so happy that water will sprout out of his mouth.” I don’t like the evil glint of his eye.
Now, before you jump to conclusions, I don’t really believe in magic. If magic existed, it certainly hadn’t been shared with us. The only reason I want to see the frog is because I know grandpa is bluffing. Five year old’s are wiser than you think. I know it would have some kind of catch. Here it is. For a five year old, I have an amazing amount of dignity. And I get the urge to prove him wrong. There is no way water can sprout out of his mouth only when I kissed it. As I weigh the options, Tata moves casually behind the frog.
“Well, are you coming or not?” he asks. At the sight of him, I quickly make up my mind. With my chin tucked out I stalk over to the statue. Trying to keep my dignity, I hesitate a split second before pressing my lips to the cold marble.
—^—
I look around, making sure no one is there. I slip toward the pool and get close to the frog. Checking once again, I quickly looked back at the frog, frowning. There has to be some kind of lever or something. But my searches are proven fruitless. Finally, the only thing left to do is prove it worked in the first place. I plant a quick kiss on his cold lips. Nothing. Confusion is written across my face. Then tata appears.
Seeing me, he stops short before doubling over in laughter. “That won’t work,” he said, “Don’t worry for another two years before he is free for marriage.” I stick out my tongue and glare at him.
“Why wont it work?” I scream.
“I have to be there.” He said calmly.
“You’re hiding something, and I’m going to find out what it is!” Just then Pablo comes out and pulls at me to go help him feed the rams.
—^—
“Can I go see the magic frog again?” I ask tata, jumping toward the pool.
“Sure.” He says chuckling.
Again, he stands behind the frog. Hmm, I’ll have to check later. Smiling, I stalk over to frog. It can’t work two times in a row. It must have been a mistake. Here’s my chance to regain my higher ground. This time I don’t hesitate. I plant a quick kiss on his stone lips. But I don’t pull away fast enough before a torrent of water meets my face. Spluttering, I wipe the water off my face. Tata grins, and stalks off, leaving me to solve this new mystery.
Slowly, I walked toward the back of the frog, where my grandfather had been standing earlier. A flash of red catches my eye. I bend down. A handle. I don’t know wether to be relieved to finally find the answer, or to be angry at Tata for tricking me. Well, I don’t know anything yet. YET. I yanked at the handle.
I jump as the sound of rushing water breaks through the stony silence.
—^—
The dusty walls sip past the car, we left it behind. I felt strange kind of sadness fill me as tata waves at us from the green door, a lonely figure in the farm. Soon he’s only a dot in the background before he disappears completely. I shift in my seat, thinking about my newest adventure.
Maybe I didn’t kiss the frog to prove a point. Maybe I wanted to believe in my tata. Maybe I thought family was more than dignity. But these thoughts are exhausting, and I am drowsy. I don’t have enough energy to fight my heavy eyelids. So I give in to sleep and let the thrumming of the engine lull me like a sweet lullaby.
Example 2 of 3 Scroll down for another example
Loosened backpack
I stepped into the Incheon International Airport. One jump at a time, quietly, but quickly. Inside the airport seemed very busy. I heard languages from all over the world. English to Spanish, Japanese to French!
“Let me see,” my father said. “So since we’re taking Korean Air, we should go to H16.”
“It’s right over… there!” I said to my father.
“Now, my son is helping! Isn’t that amazing?” my father said to my mom.
“I thought so too, but I don’t think it’s the time to talk about that because we’re not going to have enough time to cruise around the airport,” my mom replied
In a jiffy, our whole family ran to H16 and got our boarding passes. Then, we faced another problem. We had to look for our entrance. That seemed fairly easy for my sister. With her razor-sharp mind, we were able to find the entrance. As we were showing our passports to the security guards, my mom asked me, “EJ, do you know where my phone is?”
“Not quite sure, but it should be in your bag.” I replied.
“Well it’s not there,” she said while she was rummaging through her bag to find her Phone. We had passed security and were at our gate. We still had about an hour left so we decided to sit down and wait. While we were waiting, my sister asked me, “Would you go to the store and buy me some snacks?”
“Sure! What do you want?” I asked her with the excitement for the fact that I was actually going somewhere alone to buy something.
“Can you go and buy me some Oreos and Pringles?” she asked me.
“Sure!” I answered as I ran over to the store. When I came back from the store with the snack, it was about the time to go and catch our plane. We sauntered to the gate and found a seat in front of of our gate. I was exhausted.
“Passengers going to LA, please start boarding,” the voice said.
“We’ll go later,” my mom said.
After a few minutes, we started getting ready to be aboard. As we entered the gate, I felt like if I was flying already in airplane.
Inside the airplane seemed very loud. Trying to find my seat was my only joy at that moment, but I was worried if our seats were at the back.
“Found it,” my sister said. I was sad that I wasn’t the one who found the seat. I always liked seat nearest to the window, but this time, I didn’t feel like seating there. I sat on the middle with my sister, my dad, and my mom beside me, squished between them. When the plane was taking off, I felt so great that we were going back to Peru.
“Another journey to Peru has begun,” I told my mom while I was getting ready to play with my ipad.
“Yes, another one,” my mom replied.
“Anyways, did you have the chance to look for you phone?” I asked curiously.
“Oh yeah, it was in my bag squished between our passports,” she replied.
The flight took us 12 hours and 30 minutes. It made me felt like dying for me because I was in a plane without even moving.
When we arrived at the LAX, I felt so refreshed. Another moment that I always enjoyed was there. It was time to find our luggage. My mom walked to the bathroom while we were finding our first luggage. We found another one, we picked it up. We found our third suitcase, we picked it up. It was time for our final suitcase where our bought things were stored in. It wasn’t there. I started looking for it. We started looking for it over and over going from the end of the line to the other end of the line. When the whole family started looking for it, we were lost. The answer was no. Me and my sister were very worried because our computers and toys were in there. “What are we going to do?” I asked to my father.
“Well I don’t think somebody stole the luggage, I think somebody took it because they thought it was theirs,” my father replied.
“Then, how are we going to find it?” my sister asked.
“We’ll find a way,” my father said. “Don’t worry about it.” Then, me and my sister showed a very worried face. My father laughed when he saw our face.
When my mom came back from the bathroom, she was wondering about what happened. When my dad told my mom what happen to our luggage, she seemed frustrated. “Well, I think there is nothing to worry about,” my mom said while she was calming herself down.
“What do you mean?” my sister and I asked at the same time like if our brains were connected to each others.
“Just ask the stewardess,” my mom replied. Her accent showed us that was the obvious answer. My father started looking for the stewardesses.
“There they are!” I shouted to my dad.
“Oh yeah, I’ll go and ask them,” my father told my mom as he started walking to the stewardesses.
When he came back, he told us that the stewardesses also think that somebody took it because they thought it was their luggage. “So, what are they going to do?” I asked to my dad.
“Well they’ll go out first and look for luggage,” he replied. “But first we have to go through that long line of security check.”
For me, the line seemed hard to go through. It was very long. One step at a time, we started to saunter to the metal detector. I was tired. I wanted to go out. I wanted to breath some fresh air. We were close to getting out. The metal detector always seemed so scary for me. This time, I didn’t have time to be scared. I wanted the bag. I really did. We stepped out of the airport hoping that our bag will be there. Our hope became the truth. It was there.
We took a taxi to our hotel and checked in right away. I opened the door and laid down on the bed. All of my memories of the trip came back to my mind. Everything was here and safe. I was here and safe.
Example 3 of 3 Scroll down for one final examples
Water bottle flip challenge
I was getting ready, I drank a water bottle until there was only about one fourth of water left. I went to a table in the living room and started practising the water bottle flip challenge. You are supposed to try to flip the water bottle and make it stand up straight. 1st try, I failed, 2nd try I failed again, I thought in my head “Man i’m bad at this”, 3rd try I failed, but then the 4th try, i also failed. But then the 5th, I MADE IT!!! I was really excited because it was really difficult to do it. I did it again and again.
I called my sister ,Victoria, so she could see because she knew it was difficult to do it. When she was going down the stairs, I through the water bottle right next her feet but it didn’t land up straight. I told Victoria that I did a water bottle flip. She told me to show her. But as always, when I try to show someone I can’t do it and when no one is looking, I can. She wouldn’t believe me, she left the living room. Of course, as soon as she left, I made it. I wanted her to believe me so I recorded myself. I started to flip the water bottle trying to make it. I recorded about 1,000 videos (i’m exaggerating) and when I made it I went to show Victoria When I was with her, I started erasing the videos in which I missed but I accidently erased the one I made it. It was the worst day of my life.
My cousin came to me and said
“Andres I can help you show Victoria the water bottle flip.”
“Thanks, but how are you going to help me?” I asked.
“I’m going to record you but you won’t notice, and for some reason people do things better when they think no one is looking, so you just have to do water bottle flips and i will record you but you won’t notice.”
“ Ok, sounds good, let's do it.”
I started doing water bottle flips all day but I didn’t make it once. I tried and tried. I finally made it! But guess what, MY COUSIN WAS NOT RECORDING! He forgot to record and just started watching videos. I was so exhausted and tired, I felt so, so, I don’t even know how to explain how I felt, I literally face palmed.
I went to sleep to release all the stress and I started thinking about ways to show Victoria I could do it. I fell asleep but i couldn’t think a way to show her. I can remember that I dreamed about a water bottle flip. It was about me never missing, it was awesome.
At morning, I changed clothes and ate breakfast. When I finished eating my delicious pancakes, I went to my cousin and showed him I could do it, he hasn't seen me do a water bottle flip so I wanted to show him. I went to a table and he followed me, I got the water bottle, and threw it. Guess what. I actually made it at the first try!Excited and feeling confident I went running to Victoria and I said to her
“ I just made a bottle flip the first try.”
“I don't believe you” Victoria said as she walked into her room.
“Really Victoria, Andres actually made it” My cousin replied.
“Then let me see” Victoria commanded.
“Ok” I replied. I kneeled down and grabbed the water bottle. I was calming down repeating to myself “you can do this” I got ready I threw the bottle, and I failed. I won’t give up, I will keep on trying until you see it, I tried like a million time on front of her but I could not make it. Victoria said that I was wasting her time so she left.
I went to my room to calm down and just practice. I practiced all day, well, almost all day, I tried and tried and tried. I made it lot of time but unfortunately, no one was looking. I kept trying, I threw the bottle just as my sister came in, the water bottle flipped, Victoria looked closely, the water bottle landed, Victoria looked at the bottle amazed. It was the happiest moment of the week! She finally believed me and I tried it again, and again, and I could make it! I was so relieved.
Now I can calmly pass the day doing water bottle flips just for fun.
Bonus: Example 4 Thanks for scrolling down!
Doki Escaped
When I moved to Curitiba I was 3 years old. I moved into a very big condominium. It has 67 houses and it was very big. The condo had a very big lake and ducks swam there on the lake. There were also lots of tadpoles. On the condominium there was also a clubhouse and also a forest. My friend and I made new trails but we had to be careful because on the condominium there were snakes on the forest. We once saw a snake but she went away quickly but other times we found snake skin all over the place. After I came back home to sleep, on the morning I realized something.
“Mom come here, I need help, fast,” I screamed crying like crazy.
“I am coming right back son what is the problem?” My mom came fast to my room.
I spoke. “ Doki escaped”.
I went to the kitchen to eat breakfast really quick.
I went down from my house to my friend’s house. I asked him, ”Did you see Doki nearby?”.
Doki is my dog, he is a Yorkshire terrier and also a part of my life. I looked for him everywhere. We looked on the park, we looked at the playground, we looked on the lake, we even looked at the skate park and he wasn’t there. My mom and I went to the common area but we didn't see him anywhere. We even went to the woods in the condominium. He did not appear anywhere. We walked the 67 house condominium. My house was number 65. To look for my dog Doki, my mom and I had to spread out, Doki could be anywhere. I looked at my friend’s house, inside the house and in the garden there was nothing.
My friend Bruno helped me and my sister had just arrived from her friend’s house. So Bruno said “I can help you look for Doki”.
We accepted and we went to look all over the condominium. We stopped and we saw a tail that was just like my dog’s but it was another dog but the same breed.
Me, my mom and bruno kept looking for him but there was no Doki.
After a while we went back very sad to eat lunch. We ate lasagna and it was the best thing I've ever eaten in my life. I could feel the pasta going through my mouth and the burning sauce covering me with pleasure. After we remembered that we had to look for Doki.
My sister said,” Let's go guys let's go find doki so everyone is happy”
I said, “Lets spread out. I am going with my sister to the woods, Bruno is going to the main gate with his sister Luiza, and my mom is going to look near my house.
“Come on let's go,” I screamed determinedly,
My sister and I went to the woods and were scared that a big dog had bitten him and he was hurt or the he had lost himself. We went into the dark woods the birds squeaked, the snakes slivered, anything could’ve happened to him. We didn't find no Doki. After a lot of searching we decided to search into the lake but there were just ducks swimming calmly. On the soccer court there were just two boys playing soccer.
My mom asked any possible neighbour if they had seen Doki but every one answered no. Bruno and Luiza were also unsuccessful because they didn't find him either.
Everyone was sad until the door man of the condo brought Doki on his hand and said “ I found him sneaking into a bush so I brought it back”.
My mom, my sister and I were very happy but we had to go tell my friends that were still searching for Doki. That doki came back. So we went to the main gate where bruno and luiza were looking and we told the “We found Doki!!”
They were very happy and helped us tell the rest.
But after I thought that a lot of dogs in the condo at least once had escaped from home. When we finally went inside of our house it just started raining so we were very lucky. After we ate dinner we throwed the ball to Doki and we played a lot of time.
When it was time to sleep my mom gave me a goodnight kiss and I slept with doki that day because I was very happy. I dreamed that doki was happy playing with me.
The next morning i woke up and doki wasn't in my bed so i searched for him and he had escaped again. I looked again but he was on the kitchen eating his dog food. I was kind of shocked of what happened the day before, that I was worried.