1. & Setting Up the Writer’s Notebook
Six Word Memoirs
& Setting Up the Writer’s Notebook

2. Writer’s Notebook Overview
The Writer’s Notebook is a SAFE place to write. If you cannot write freely, you will not write truthfully. If you do not write truthfully, you do not write well.
There is an exception.
You may request that an entry not be read.
The Writer’s Notebook is a place to develop ideas, not to finish them. Do not censor your writing.

3. When taking notes, everything in RED is to be copied into your notebook.
Start a new page for each entry.
Date each entry.
Label each entry on the top line. I will always tell you what to label. This will ensure I am able to check each entry.

4. Open to the first page in your notebook
Open to the first page in your notebook. Place the date in the left hand margin and label the top line “Six Word Memoirs”

5. Definition of memoir
A memoir is how someone remembers his or her own life, focusing on a particularly vivid or important time that shaped who that person is.

6. Capture WHO you are!
Make lists of facts about yourself, who you are, and what you like to do. For example: Where do you live? How many siblings do you have? What are your favorite things to do, favorite foods, etc.?

7. What is the Six Word Memoir?
Ernest Heminway’s Six Word Story: For Sale: Baby Shoes, Never Worn What type of story does this tell? How does the limited words and the choice of how to tell the story impact the meaning? Think about the power packed into these six words.

8. Six Word Memoir Video

9. Writing Six-Word Memoirs
Use the brainstorm to focus on a couple of important words that define you. Play with your words until you are able to sum up an aspect of yourself in exactly SIX WORDS. When you have a final draft, decorate your memoir on the half sheets of paper, and we will publish them on the wall.