1. Use of Short Stories for Language Teaching Purposes
Lecturer Betul ALTAŞ

2. What is a short story?
What are the important elements in a short story?

3. What is a short story?
A brief work of fiction, centered around one incident
A plotted narrative (Russel, 2009).
Short stories date back to oral storytelling traditions (Homer’s Illiad and Odyssey)

4. Important elements of short stories
Plot: the series of related events in a story
There are five main parts in the structure of the plot
exposition
rising action
climax
falling action
resolution/ denouement

5. Exposition Setting, characters and situation
Rising action Conflict (a person against another, society or a group; a person against nature or one person against himself/herself)
Climax the point of highest excitement
Falling action the point in which the excitement decreases
Resolution/denouement the part in which the conflict is resolved

6. The most common techniques
Suspense: Excitement
Foreshadowing : Hints/clues
Flashback
Surprise ending: unexpected use of irony

7. Characters Protagonist (leading character such as hero or heroine)
Antagonist (opposed to protagonist)
Minor characters
Dynamic characters
Static characters
Round characters
Flat characters (referring to one side)
Stock characters (stereotypes)

8. Setting Setting refers to time and place.
Time (specific year, decade or century)
Place (particular town, city, state, region or country)

9. Narrator
Narrator of a story is the person tells the story from his/her viewpoint and with his/her knowledge (Fellag, 1993).
The narrator can be:
a participant in action of story
an outsider reporting the actions
The role of the narrator determines by whom the story is told.

10. Point of view The position from which the story is told.
First person point of view
Third person point of view

11. Third person point of view: narration from a third person’s point of view.
omniscient (narration about characters)
non-omniscient (narration from a limited perspective)

12. Third person point of view may be intrusive or unintrusive.
Style : word choice, the figures of speech such as metaphor, irony, symbols and to name a few)
Theme : central message

13. Advantages of using short stories
Four skills
Vocabulary and grammar
Motivation
Culture of target community through cultural concepts
Critical thinking skills/ cognitive abilities

14. Some problems
Comprehension (plot, characters, vocabulary, role of narrator
Motivation: (lack of confidence, uninteresting content of stories, reluctance in reading)
Inadequate reading strategies
Making interpretations
Understanding the cultural background
Appreciation of the style

15. Sample activities for analysis of short stories
Pre-reading
While-reading
Post-reading

16. Pre-reading Bakground information Specific information
Model strategies
Stimuli for student’s interest (Grabe &Stoller, 2001)
Cultural background (Lazar, 1993)
Pre-teaching vocabulary as well as grammar
(Lazar, 1993)

17. While-reading
The most common focus is on asking comprehension questions.
According to Lazar (1993),there can be activities to help students:
to understand the plot and characters
with style and language
with challenging vocabulary words

18. Post-reading The focus of the activities is on :
students’ interpretations of the text
understanding narrative point of view
follow-up writing activities
follow-up fluency practice