In order to find out the main points of the work, it must be carefully analyzed. Unfortunately, not everyone knows where to start this work. A story analysis plan will help structure the reader’s thoughts and qualitatively reveal all aspects of the work.
Where to begin?
Every student is faced with the task of analyzing a text. As a rule, in a literature lesson this is a work included in school curriculum. But what to do when detailed story do you need to do it yourself? It's worth starting by setting a goal.
If the main task is to analyze an episode in a story, then its role in it should be determined. As a rule, one of the most important scenes in the work is offered for study. For example, how the hero showed himself in this or that case, what traits were revealed in this case.
But often the teacher requires you to analyze the story as a whole, and for this you need to study the work in more detail.
Key Aspects
You have carefully read the text, now you need to make a plan for analyzing the story.
Start by defining its topic. Usually there are several of them in the text: themes of friendship, devotion, duty, love. It is necessary to identify the most basic ones.
Now it’s worth moving on to the description of the main characters. It's not only appearance, which is also important, but also the main character traits of the characters. Then we move on to the role of the heroes in revealing the problems of the story. Their relationship is also important aspect plan.
Minor characters often play an important role in a work. Literary analysis the story must include their description and characteristics.
Composition and its components
Next we move on to the structure of the story itself. Each work has individual construction features. First, let's define the prologue, that is, the moment before the main action. Then we will move on to the beginning and describe the moment when the conflict or problem of the work began.
Now it is necessary to identify the development of action in the story. This part of the composition is usually the longest. In it we will see the main characters, their descriptions, and the main events. But the most poignant moment in the story is called the climax. This is an event in which all the secrets of the work are revealed and the most intense actions take place. Now all that remains is to complete the analysis of the composition with a denouement. This is an element that relieves the so-called tension after the climax, describes what happened to the characters after the events that occurred.
Story Analysis Plan
Having completed the study of the work, it remains to define it artistic originality. Should be specified creative manner any writer that distinguishes him from other authors. Funds used artistic expression, found in the text, will make the analysis more complete and in-depth. Don't forget about epithets, personification, metaphors and other tropes.
After this, proceed to the conclusion, which will include author's attitude to the problem, as well as your own opinion and impression.
Let us list the main points that the plan for analyzing a story in literature contains:
- Theme of the story.
- Idea.
- Analysis of the main characters.
- Minor characters.
- Features of the composition.
- Means of expression used in the text.
- Reader's impression.
Now you can easily analyze any story using our article. The main aspects of the plan presented by us will help you do deep and high-quality work.
Writing a story plan is a mandatory element of school education. It's hard to write without a good plan good story, so you need to figure out how to properly plan a story.
Outlining a Story
If you decide to start writing your own literary work, then first of all, you need to organize your ideas. Remember to write down all information relevant to your work. It is difficult to retain a lot of information in your head, and it is even more difficult not to get confused in it.
- Decide on the topic of the story.
- Think about what subtopics you want to cover in your piece.
- Make a list characters: their names, occupation, features of appearance and character, relationships with each other. For each hero you need to prepare brief description. The list of characteristics should resemble the one that precedes the plays, for example, Igor Ignatievich, landowner, 48 years old. Married to Natalya Igorevna. Loves hunting. After the shocks he experienced during the war, he stutters.
- Starting from the main subtopics, write a detailed outline of the story. It should include not only the main points, but also sub-points of the second and third levels. To make your work easier, immediately write down the approximate volume of each part. The plan must be harmonious, its parts are interconnected in a logical sequence. Work it through carefully, then further work will be easier and the result will be of better quality. A good outline should convey the content of the story concisely and accurately.
- When writing a story, try not to “lose” your characters and bring storyline each of them up to logical conclusion. One of the main keys to the success of writing a story is a successful climax and denouement. After all, they are the ones that remain in the reader’s memory after finishing reading the work.
- After work on the plan is completed, you need to carefully check your plan (and subsequently the story) for various types of errors.
Plan of the finished text
Drawing up a plan is an essential component of analyzing an already written story. It helps to remember the content of a work, structure its events in a logical sequence, and determine the relationship between individual parts.
- First, read the story, determine its main theme, and highlight the names of the main characters.
- Divide the text into four parts:
- beginning;
- plot development;
- climax;
- denouement.
- These points will be the backbone of your plan. If necessary, divide each of these parts into several smaller ones, noting in your mind or in the text the beginning of each of them.
- Re-read the first part. Give it a title. The name should be concise and succinct. Try to convey the essence of this fragment of the story in one sentence.
- Do the same procedures with other parts.
Types of plans
Sometimes a task requires you to make a plan certain type. In order to cope with this, you need to familiarize yourself with the main four types of plans:
- interrogative Each point of the plan is a question, the answer to which conveys the essence of this fragment (Where did Taras go after school?);
- thesis. The content of the paragraph is expressed through the theses of the verbal structure - a brief formulation of the main position of a specific part, containing verbs (Taras went to the stadium);
- nominative. A plan of theses that are expressed by nouns (Taras at the stadium);
- basic plan. This plan consists of fragments of sentences that carry the main semantic load (Plan of Taras - going to the stadium);
- combined. Such a plan may contain several different types of plans.
Text composition
When drawing up a story plan, you should adhere to the classic composition:
- Introduction - in this section it is necessary to familiarize the reader with the place and time of action, as well as some of the key characters.
- Premise - describe the event that led to further development stories.
- The development of actions is the largest part of the story.
- Climax is the highest point in the development of events.
- The denouement is the conclusion that tells how their actions turned out for the heroes.
As you can see, the ability to competently draw up a plan is an indispensable skill when analyzing and memorizing texts. Writing a good story will not be easy unless its structure is clearly and logically laid out in the form of a list of points and sub-points.
When the plan is ready, you can start writing the story, useful information on writing a story can be found in the article.
Why are they compiled? plan works? For example, so that later you can easily recall a read novel, play or poem. And when compiling plan and the plot-compositional structure of the text is usually taken as a basis.
Instructions
Read the work.
While reading, pay attention to the division of the text: parts, chapters, acts, stanzas.
While reading, make the necessary notes: title works, names of its parts (chapters, acts), various descriptions of nature, lyrical digressions, author's reasoning.
Determine plan what type will you use: thesis, nominative, question, plan-scheme.
Also decide on the view plan and, it can be: simple (compressed), complex (expanded), quotative.
Identify exposure works(in dramaturgical works x is a list of characters and an indication of the place of action).
Determine whether the book has a prologue and an epilogue.
Find the hook works.
Establish the main part of the novel (story, short story, etc.), i.e. development of action.
Bring out the climax.
Determine the ending of the book.
Match the plot and composition works.
Decide who are the main characters and who are the supporting characters.
Determine how the author’s attitude towards the characters changes as the plot develops, and for this:
- write out quotes from the text that reveal the speech characteristics of the characters -
- Analyze quotes in the text that reveal the linguistic features of the author’s narrative -
- Determine how the main character’s attitude towards other main and secondary characters changes as the plot develops -
- Compare the relationships between the other main and minor characters, and how they change as the plot progresses.
Come up with a title for each part of the plot, guided by author's position regarding the characters, their speech characteristics, or in accordance with the rubric works.
Make an initial draft plan a, leaving between its points intervals of several lines or wide margins on the page.
Reread plan.
Make the necessary corrections to the margins of the page or to those left between paragraphs plan and intervals.
Rewrite plan in accordance with the amendments.
Final version plan and use it in analysis works or when reading it again, taking notes, etc.
There are two situations in which we need to write an essay - quiet at home and exam situations, where maximum concentration is required. However, the algorithm for drawing up a plan remains the same in both cases.
The essay plan is the main task of the essay. It represents a chain, a sequence of your thoughts that lead to the disclosure of a topic. Any topic. In any field of knowledge - literature, history, social studies or biology.
If you write an essay at home, you will have enough time to think and the opportunity to compare your opinion with the opinion of authoritative critics or experts. Just use an Internet search engine.
If you are writing an exam essay that takes 100 minutes, spend 20 minutes thinking about the topic and making a plan. And remember, a clearly drawn up plan is half the success!
Use the generally accepted plan diagram:
I Introduction.
II Main part.
III Conclusion.
Parts of the plan are indicated by Roman numerals. Formulate the main ideas and title each part of the plan. For example:
I Introduction. The most famous theories of human origins.
Formulate and title the main part. Correctly this step of the algorithm is performed like this:
II Main part. The struggle between creationist and evolutionary theories.
There is a period at the end of the statement.
Expand the main part of the plan. Formulate the points of the plan. (The points of the main part of the plan are indicated Arabic numerals). Eg:
1. Darwin's theory:
2. Creationism:
We put a colon.
Formulate the sub-points of the plan. Sub-items of the main part of the plan are indicated by letters. The sub-clause looks like this:
a) contradictions in Darwin's theory-
After each subparagraph you need to put a comma or semicolon.
Important points
Each of your points or paragraphs should contain only one idea. Describe the opinion of the author or supporters of the theory, note the strong and weak sides, express your point of view.
In each point or paragraph of the plan, it is necessary to comply with the main idea of the entire essay. Don't get carried away by outside ideas, especially if you are limited by space and time.
The introduction and conclusion should not be different, because you are defending only one main idea. In the introduction, formulate it as correctly as possible, from your point of view. In conclusion, write the same thing, only in different words.
Make each of the plans?
Let's try to do this using the example of a story
A drop in the sea
We once caught a turtle in the sea. She was big, very big. Not a turtle, but a real house on clubbed legs.
We put this turtle on the deck. And she suddenly burst into tears. In the morning he cries, in the evening he cries, and at lunch, too, drip-drip... The sun has rolled into the sea - the turtle is crying. She feels sorry for the sun. The stars have gone out - she cries again. She feels sorry for the stars.
We also felt sorry for the turtle. We released her into the blue sea. Then we found out: she deceived us... She didn’t feel sorry for anything. Turtles cry because they live in the sea. The water in the sea is salty. The turtles cry out the excess salt from the water.
(According to G. Tsyferov).
Make a text plan
1. Read the work.
2. Determine the idea, that is, the main idea.
3. Formulate the idea in a few sentences.
4. Express the idea in one sentence.
5. Divide the work into semantic parts.
6. Title each part.
7. Read the names of the parts and check how accurately they convey the content of the text; did you miss any episode?
Types of plan
Questionable
Abstract
Nominative
Plan - reference diagram
Combined
Question plan
The plan is written in the form of questions to the text. Each question is about one semantic part of the text. Questions should be asked in such a way that the answers to them help to restore the content of the entire text.
When compiling question plan better use question words(“how”, “how much”, “when”, “why”, etc.), and not phrases with the particle “whether” (“is there”, “did you find”, etc.).
For example:
-Who was caught at sea?
-What was the caught turtle crying about?
- Why was the turtle really crying?
Thesis plan
The plan is written down in the form of abstracts*.
*Thesis is a briefly formulated idea of a paragraph or part of a text.
Each thesis corresponds to one semantic part of the text. There are a lot of verbs in this regard.
For example:
- A turtle was caught in the sea.
- The turtle weeps out excess salt from the body.
Name plan
The plan is written in the form of abstracts that do not use verbs.
In terms of names there are many nouns and adjectives.
For example:
- Caught turtle.
- Turtle tears.
Plan - reference diagram
This plan consists of “supports”, that is, words and phrases, sentences that carry the greatest semantic load. Using the “supports” it is easy to reconstruct the text.
The choice of “supports” depends on the characteristics of your memory, goals and tasks that you set. Each person draws up a reference diagram so that it is convenient for him to use it.
For example:
-Turtle
- Tears.
- Salt from water.
Combined
Such a plan could combine different types plans.
For example:
-Who was caught at sea?
- The caught turtle cries all the time.
- The real reason tears of a turtle.
During the learning process, schoolchildren will have to complete many tasks, including preparing their own oral history on a topic assigned by the teacher. For example it could be small text O pet or retelling classic work. In order for everything to work out as it should, you should know how to create a story plan, what must be included in it. Our material will help you figure it out.
What it is
A plan is a totality structural elements, which will be present in the narrative itself, and the more extensive and detailed the list is compiled, the easier it becomes to connect the elements together and recreate a coherent, detailed text. At school, you will have to compile many such “lists”: detailed and brief, quotations and abstracts; despite the apparent complexity, this form of work is very useful, since it promotes detailed elaboration and memorization of the material.
Operating procedure
Let's look at how to create a story plan (grade 2) so that it reflects all the elements required by the teacher. There are several stages of work:
- Read the work itself.
- Determine its main idea, what is said in the text. What events are described by the author, how the text begins and ends.
- Divide the text into semantic parts (an example will be given later). Each of them must be complete in meaning.
- In the highlighted parts, indicate the most important thing, the main actions of the characters.
- Re-reading each of the fragments, coming up with a subtitle and main (key) words. There shouldn’t be too many of them, it’s enough to write them down proper names and 2-3 important nouns or adjectives.
- Detailed retelling.
This is the sequence of work that allows you to answer the question of the story. Next we present specific example, let’s analyze the text from the second grade program by L. N. Tolstoy “The Lion and the Dog.”
In London they showed wild animals and for viewing they took money or dogs and cats to feed the wild animals.
One man wanted to see the animals: he grabbed a little dog on the street and brought it to the menagerie. They let him watch, but they took the little dog and threw him into a cage with a lion to be eaten.
The little dog tucked its tail and pressed itself into the corner of the cage. The lion approached her and smelled her.
The little dog lay down on its back, raised its paws and began wagging its tail.
The lion touched it with his paw and turned it over.
The dog jumped up and stood on its hind legs in front of the lion.
The lion looked at the dog, turned his head from side to side and did not touch it.
When the owner threw meat to the lion, the lion tore off a piece and left it for the dog.
In the evening, when the lion went to bed, the dog lay down next to him and put her head on his paw.
Since then, the dog lived in the same cage with the lion, the lion did not touch her, ate food, slept with her, and sometimes played with her.
One day the master came to the menagerie and recognized his dog; he said that the dog was his own, and asked the owner of the menagerie to give it to him. The owner wanted to give it back, but as soon as they began to call the dog to take it from the cage, the lion bristled and growled.
This is how the lion and the dog lived whole year in one cell.
A year later the dog got sick and died. The lion stopped eating, but kept sniffing, licking the dog and touching it with his paw.
When he realized that she was dead, he suddenly jumped up, bristled, began to whip his tail on the sides, rushed to the wall of the cage and began to gnaw at the bolts and the floor.
All day long he struggled, thrashed about in the cage and roared, then he lay down next to the dead dog and fell silent. The owner wanted to take away the dead dog, but the lion would not let anyone near it.
The owner thought that the lion would forget his grief if he was given another dog, so he let him into his cage live dog; but the lion immediately tore her to pieces. Then he hugged the dead dog with his paws and lay there for five days.
On the sixth day the lion died.
Defining a theme
After reading a short text, you should determine its topic, that is, say what the work is about. It's not difficult - in Tolstoy's story we're talking about about a lion and a little dog, their amazing friendship. The author describes with undisguised sympathy the lion's devotion to his unexpected friend.
- The beginning - the gentleman, as a joke, decides to throw his little dog into a cage with a predator. But unexpectedly for everyone, the lion did not tear the unfortunate woman apart, but showed sympathy, and then sincerely became attached to her.
- The end is the death of both animals.
Therefore, when retelling, it is important to ensure that it starts with the meeting and ends with the death of the heroes.
Isolation of semantic parts
When considering how to outline a story, you should highlight several fragments in the text, each of which represents a complete narrative. The text is re-read again, with a pencil marking where one of the author’s thoughts ended and another began. The end of each semantic part can also be determined by the appearance of new heroes or the beginning of a new action.
In the story “The Lion and the Dog” we highlight the following fragments:
- Introduction - features of zoos of the described time (fees were charged by animals that went to feed predators).
- A man wanted to look at wild animals and brought his dog.
- The animal was thrown into the lion's cage.
- The predator took pity on the poor guy.
- An unexpected friendship between a lion and a dog.
- The owner is trying to return the pet. The formidable discontent of a predator.
- A year later the dog got sick and died.
- The lion refused food, grieved, did not accept another dog, which the owner gave him, and soon died.
Thus, we have 8 parts, each of which is complete in meaning. After dividing the text, you should carefully re-read each part and think about whether there is a need to highlight any other “piece”.
Subheadings
Considering how to create a story plan, we came to the next stage of work - to succinctly title each of the previously highlighted fragments. You should strive to present the content in 2-4 words. In our case, we get the following headers:
- Life at London Zoo.
- Cruel owner.
- Dangerous meeting.
- Predator kinder people.
- Strange friendship.
- The strong protect the weak.
- Illness and death of a dog.
- Despair and death of the lion.
We also got 8 subheadings, each of which represents a plan point. Using it, you can retell the text without any problems, since all the main events that Tolstoy described are presented in it.
Complicated plan
Sometimes the task becomes more complicated, for example, the structure may not be simple, but expanded. Let's look at how to create a story plan in this case. First, the semantic parts are also highlighted, but one or two of them should be further divided. In the text “The Lion and the Dog” you can work out parts 3 and 8 in more detail. When drawing up a retelling plan, these fragments, in turn, can be subdivided as follows:
3. Dangerous encounter.
- 3.1 The behavior of the dog (shrinked into a corner, afraid, wagging its tail).
- 3.2 Reaction of a predator (sniffed, touched, gave meat).
8. Despair and death of the lion.
- 8.1 The predator realized that his dog had died.
- 8.2 Refusal of food, flour and torment.
- 8.3 Reaction to someone else's dog.
- 8.4 Death.
Such a detailed plan, of course, requires more careful preparation, however, it is much easier to retell it.
Basic mistakes
Having looked at the animal, let’s analyze the main mistakes that schoolchildren can make. There are several of them:
- Isolating a very large or, conversely, a very small number of semantic parts.
- Violation of logic, rearrangement of parts.
- Lack of necessary components: introduction, climax and denouement.
- Incorrect selection of headings for paragraphs. It is necessary to name parts of the text in such a way that, when reading the title, you can immediately remember what is said in this fragment.
Competent and thoughtful work on the text and re-reading it repeatedly with a pencil in hand will help you avoid these mistakes. Of course, second class is only the second step primary school. Children will have enough time to learn how to analyze a work, but the sooner they start, the better the result on the Unified State Exam. Therefore, work on drawing up a text plan should be given Special attention, it helps to highlight the main thing and weed out unimportant details, trains thinking, logic and memory.
We looked at how to create a story plan (2nd grade), what stages the work should consist of. If something doesn’t work out the first time, don’t be discouraged, you have to work hard, then the result won’t take long to arrive.
