| A | B |
|---|
| out in the rain | got wet |
| dropped pencil | leaned over to pick it up |
| stubbed toe | OUCH! |
| fell off bicycle | scrapped knee |
| wandered off the trail | got lost |
| missed bus | walked home |
| misbehaved on playground | got punished |
| jumped lunch line | teacher put me at the end of line |
| didn't know math facts | can't do math problems |
| fought on the school bus | had to sit in front seat |
| didn't listen to instructions | didn't know how to do work |
| forgot to bring lunch | had to eat in cafeteria |
| typed password wrong | didn't get into the computer |
| didn't wash hands | got sick |
| ate healthy food | stayed well |
| didn't clean my room | couldn't find my shoes |
| Good vs. Evil | good triumphing over evil, and all the better if "good" is is vastly outmatched by "evil" but triumphs anyway |
| Man vs. Nature | the main character finds himself pitted against weather/environment, animals, or life/death. Sometimes humans triumph over nature; more commonly, nature triumphs over humans. Rarely, man and nature learn to exist together in harmony; more often, mankind risks destroying nature and themselves with untamed technology. |
| Love and Friendship | stories about love, in all its forms: romantic, platonic, godly, unrequited, familial, and altruistic. Usually, love triumphs over the barriers (natural, societal) placed in its way though, sometimes, love is unable to overmaster the odds set against it |
| Man vs Society | there are more examples of society conquering man than examples of man conquering society; though sometimes these two forces end in an uneasy draw |
| Man vs. Himself | The usual subtext of these stories is that man carries within him the seeds of his own destruction, and the causes of self-destruction. |
| Fate/Faith/Predestination vs. Free Will | explores whether man has the power to create his destiny, or whether his destiny is predetermined, whether by willful gods or fickle fate. The theme features reluctant heroes who are somehow "chosen" or "predestined" to save the world. |
| Suffering and Redemption | Features characters who are able to overcome obstacles or redeem past mistakes through courage, sacrifice, remorse, or divine intervention. |
| The Great Journey | Character or characters go through a series of episodic adventures as they travel. It may be a sad story or a happy story, or it may even be comedic |
| Loss of Innocence | coming of age story. Introduces and innocent character to the evil or complexity of the real/adult world. |
| Noble Sacrifice | Can be made for any reason except self - a loved one, an enemy, a group of people, the whole of humanity, a dog - the bottom line is that the protagonist sacrafices himself or herself in an effort to save others. |
| Great Battle | People or groups of people in conflict. It is sometines good vs. evil, but not always. |
| Revenge | To get back at someone or something. The subject is obvious, but the outcome differs. Sometimes the outcome is good adn sometimes the outcome is bad. |
| Big Mystery | Something unexplained happened and it is the protagonist's job to find and explanation for it. |
| Fall from Grace | This theme shows us people going where only God should go, doing what only God is menat to do, or attempting to do something that human beings should never do. Misfortune always follows as a direct result of thier action or and act of God. |
| Fate | Greek tragedies fit this category. Often, there is a major reversal of fortune. It could be from good-to-bad or from bad-to-good. |
| Big Trick | Someone or some group of people intentionally deceive someone else. |
| simile | a comparison using "like" or "as" |
| metaphor | a comparison not using "like" or "as" |
| personification | giving human actions to a non-human |
| hyperbole | an exaggeration |
| onomatopoeia | words that make a sound |
| synonym | words that have the same or similar meaning |
| antonym | words that have opposite meanings |
| homophones | words that sound the same, but are spelled differently and have different meanings |
| central conflict | the main struggle or problem in the plot of a poem, story or play |
| character | a person or animal who takes part in the action of a literary work |
| characterization | the act of creating or describing a character, by showing what they say, do and think, showing what other characters say about them, and by showing what physical features, dress and personality they display |
| climax | the point of highest interest and suspense in a literary work. It sometimes signals the turning point of the action in a story or play |
| coming-of-age story | a tale in which a young person makes a discovery about himself or herself or about the world. It also allows different generations to learn about each other |
| concrete poem | a poem with a shape that suggests its subject |
| dialogue | conversation involving two or more people or characters |
| epic | a long story., often told in verse, that tells of a culture's heroes and gods |
| external conflict | a struggle that takes place between a character and something outside that character such as another character, society or nature |
| first person | narrator (person telling the story) takes part in the action and refers to himself or herself using words such as I and we |
| foreshadowing | the act of hinting at events that will happen later in a literary work |
| image | language that creates a concrete representation of an object or an experience |
| imagery | the images in a poem or passage considered all together |
| inciting incident | the event that introduces the central conflict or struggle, in a poem, story, or play |
| internal conflict | a struggle that takes place inside the mind of the character |
| irony | a difference between appearance and reality, an event that contradicts the expectations of the characters, the reader, or the audience of a literary work |
| metaphor | a figure of speech that is spoken or written about as if it were another |
| mood | the feeling or emotion that the writer creates in a literary |
| motive | a reason for acting in a certain way |
| motivation | a force that moves a character to think, feel, or behave in a certain way |
| myth | a story that explains the beginning of things or events in the natural world. These objects are explained as being caused by some supernatural force or being, often a god. |
| narrative poem | a verse that tells a story |
| one-dimensional character | flat character who reveals only one quality or character trait |
| onomatopoeia | the use of words or phrases like meow or beep that sound like what they name |
| personification | a figure of speech in which something not human is described as if it were human |
| resolution | the point in a poem, story, or play at which the central conflict or struggle ends |
| sensory details | words or phrases that describe how things look, sound, smell, taste or feel |
| setting | the time and place in which a literary work happens |
| simile | a comparison using like or as |
| stress | the amount of emphasis given to a syllable |
| symbol | a thing that stands for or represents both itself and something else |
| theme | a central idea in a literary work |
| third person point of view | in a story, when the narrator does not take part in the action and tells the story using words such as he and she and avoiding the use of I and we |
| three-dimensional character | a character who seems to have all the complexities of an actual human being |
| from whose perspective | Point of view |
| I, me, my, we, our | 1st person |
| all knowing, the narrator can see into the minds of all characters | 3rd person Omniscient |
| Narrator can see into ONE character's mind | 3rd person Limited |
| Narrator only describes and does not enter characters' thoughts | 3rd person Objective |
| First person narrator | Story is told from a main characters view |
| 3rd Omniscient | godlike narrator, can enter character's minds and knows everything, may be a narrator outside the text |
| 3rd Limited | all characters have thought privacy except ONE |
| 3rd Objective | the narrator reports what happens and what the characters are saying |
| setting | where and when |
| characters | people, animals, creatures who take part in the action |
| internal conflict | character vs. self |
| external conflict | character vs. nature |
| external conflict | character vs. character |
| resolution | ending of the story |
| theme | message of the story to apply to your own life |
| climax | most exciting part where conflict is resolved |
| plot pyramid | way to organize sequence of events on paper |
| rising action | events building up to the climax |
| summary | It briefly restates main idea and the most important details. |
| main idea | It is the most important idea in a story that can be stated in one sentence. |
| inferencing | What is likely to happen? |
| facts | Details which tell who, what, where, when, why, and how. They can be proven. |
| opinions | It is a thought, feeling, or attitude. |
| sequencing | What happened first, next, then, finally and in what order? |
| problem | It is something a character struggles with in a story. |
| plot | The events that happen in a story. |
| predictions | Use your own experiences and information from the story to guess what might happen. |
| compare | How are things alike? |
| contrast | How are things different? |
| cause | A person, thing, or even that makes something happen. |
| effect | Something made to happen by a person or thing. |
| purpose | This is a plan or intention by an author. |
| feelings | Examples are joy, sorrow, fear,anger, and happiness. |
| emotions | A very strong feeling of any kind. |
| graphic sources | These show information in different ways and in picture form. |
| setting | This is the when and where of a story. |
| analogies | This is a way to compare similiar things. |
| synonyms | A word that means the same thing. |
| antonyms | A word that means the opposite. |
| homonyms | These are words that sound the same but are spelled differently and have different meanings. |
| prefixes | A group of letters added to the beginning of a root word. |
| suffixes | A letter or group of letters added to the end of a root word. |
| legend | A story coming down from the past. |
| folktale | A story or legend originating and handed down from common people. |
| fable | A story that is made up to teach a lesson. |
| advertisement | This is a public announcement. |
| newspaper | Sheets of paper printed every day of the week, telling stories, ads, and sharing pictures. |
| prove it | Where did you find the information in the story? |
