6-WORD MEMOIRS

You have 6 words. What will your story be?

6-Word Memoirs

•A memoir is a memory or a collection of memories that tells someone’s life story or an important moment in the author’s life.

•A 6 word memoir is an extremely short and simplified memoir that can tell a person’s life, a memory, a defining moment, or a motto the author lives by

The first known 6-Word Memoir

Ernest Hemingway was challenged to create a novel using only 6 words. He created the following 6-word memoir:

“Baby Shoes. For Sale. Never Worn.”

– Ernest Hemingway

What can you infer about hemingway based on this memoir?

Read each of the following 6 word memoirs. What can you infer about each person?

"Moving again.

Goodbye strangers.

Hello strangers”

“Fall 100 Times, Get up 101.”

•

Life is short. Eat dessert first.

Tips for writing a 6-word memoir

Make it personal: The memoir should be specific to your life
LIMITATIONS: Limitations force you to be creative. Write a great memoir because of the six-word parameter, not in spite of it
Inspiration: Get inspired by reading other memoirs.
Show, Don't Tell: Concrete words “Sixteen years with pencil in hand.” and descriptions of actions “Woke up. Fell Asleep. Missed Bus.” can help “drive home” the main idea of your memoir.
Scramble your sentences: Experiment with sentence structure by putting your memoir in one, two, or three-word sentences. “The stories saved me from reality.” is communicated more clearly when it is broken into two sentences: “Suffered from reality. Stories saved me.” Also, don't forget to play with the punctuation! (Bang! Ow! Story of my life).
Liven it up: Using figurative language to make comparisons (metaphor) or adding human qualities (personification) can give your memoir more life. For example, “School. 12 years of hard work.” can be livened up with a metaphor: “Sentenced to 12 years of school”.
Use your own voice: You can hear the author's voice in “Doctor? I wanna be a T-Rex!” and “Fishin' long into the starry night.”
Sometimes honesty is the best policy: Some of the best memoirs are brutally honest. “My hightop fade trampled my adversaries.”; “I am Ironman. Minus the armor.”
Revise, revise, revise: Remember, there is no such thing as a magical writing fairy. The secret to writing is to write. Play with your words until you fill one or more pages with drafts of your memoir. Drafting will help you write a memoir that will make your audience's neck hair stand on end when they read it.

More examples:

•“So lost, had to google myself”

•“Recipe for failure? Change the ingredients”

•“Wont let magazines shape my body”

•“She’s my flashlight in the dark”

•“My brain is a box of crayons”

“Well, I thought it was funny”- Stephen Colbert

Assignment

Students will create their own original 6-word memoir

It must be personal and it must have meaning.
6 WORDS ONLY; NO MORE, NO LESS
Students will then write a short paragraph; three to 5 sentences describing their memoir and how it reflects their life motto, their history or their personality
Students will write their 6-word memoir and description in either Microsoft Word or as a Google Doc and submit the assignment to their Google Classroom.
The memoir cannot just be a collection or list of words, it must form a cohesive sentence or statement.
The description must use full sentences.
Everything must be school appropriate

Rubric (How it will be graded)

The actual 6 words for your memoir (60%)
Originality/Uniqueness/follows instructions- not just a simple catchphrase found on the internet or quick google search. Not just a list of words but an actual statement (10%)
Description- Student wrote at least 3 full sentences which describes or explains the 6-word memoir (30%)

Once your 6-word memoir is complete, you will use your memoir in a surprise foldable

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