Sweeter Than Fiction: How Authors Use Primary Sources to Inform Narratives

Using Claudia Friddell and Elizabeth Baddeley’s engaging children’s book "Grace Banker and Her Hello Girls Answer the Call" as a mentor text, students will explore and analyze the important –and for readers, often unnoticed– role of research and primary sources in writing a narrative about the past, whether it is a work of historical fiction, creative nonfiction, or a biography.

This lesson helps introduce students to different writing genres and the work that they produce during this lesson can serve as an example if they are assigned to write their own original narratives.