WRITING WITH EXTERNAL TEXT FRAMES

The I-Journey:

Text Frames are…

…the frame (or skeleton, or structure…) around which the information is written.

INTERNAL text frames are ways of organizing information within the paragraphs themselves.

EXTERNAL text frames are ways of organizing information that are not part of the paragraphs themselves.

INTERNAL TEXT FRAMES

How is the information organized throughout the writing?

Examples you will recognize: Cause-effect Chronological order Spatial order Question-answer Problem-solution Order of importance Concept-examples

EXTERNAL TEXT FRAMESYou’ve probably seen these in some fiction narratives:

Some less common ones:

Illustrations Captions (for

illustrations) Chapter titles or

headings Different fonts Bold, italics, all-caps Changing

narrators/points of view

Maps Footnotes Endnotes Free verse/poetry Memos Letters Script-style dialogue

Why use external text frames? Reader interest Breaks up the reading Just to be different Best way to present the information

(many external text frames are there to make something clear that was unclear before.)

For each of the following examples, ask yourself:

Why did the author decide to use this external text frame instead of some other one (or none at all)?

How might it make the story better?

ILLUSTRATIONS:

The Phantom

Tollbooth

ILLUSTRATIONS &

CAPTIONS:

The Tale of Despereaux

Illustrations can sometimes clarify a description.

Text and picture from From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

PARTS/SECTIONS:

The Tale of

Despereaux

CHAPTER TITLES:

The Phantom

Tollbooth

POINT OF VIEW:

Many books are told by several different narrators. This makes the story more interesting because you get to see different sides of the story.

No More Dead Dogs by Gordon Korman

The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara Pendragon series by D. J. MacHale Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer

POINT OF VIEW:

No More Dead Dogs

Use of Poetry (usually free verse): Free Verse is poetry that doesn’t have to

fit to a certain meter or rhyme scheme.

Some novels are written in free verse instead of prose. (Prose is language that’s not poetry.)

Examples: Make Lemonade by Virginia Euwer Wolff Crank (or anything else) by Ellen Hopkins

FREE VERSE:

Make Lemonade

Footnotes & Endnotes Give additional information1 without

cluttering up the text Footnotes and endnotes both use a

number in superscript, next to the sentence they refer to2.

Footnotes come at the bottom of the page; endnotes come at the end of the whole book3.1 (such as an aside)2 you could also use an asterisk or other symbol, if you want3 or paper, or whatever

FOOTNOTES:

Bartimaeus

trilogy

MAPS:

The Phantom

Tollbooth

MAPS:

From the Mixed-Up Files of

Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

MEMOS, LETTERS, AND

DOCUMENTS:

Nothing But the

Truth

LETTERS AND

DOCUMENTS:

No More Dead Dogs

DIALOGUE AS A

SCRIPT: Nothing But

the Truth

FONTS:

The Phantom

Tollbooth

NOW WHAT?

What external text frames could you use to make your I-Journey more interesting? Diary entries? Journal entries? “Newspaper clippings”? Letters? Dialogue as script? Maps? Fonts? Sections?