Scribd
Upload
259 views2 pages

Telling A Story or An Anecdote

This document provides guidance on how to tell short stories or anecdotes in English. It recommends starting with phrases like "That reminds me" or "Did I ever tell you about" and keeping stories brief while using sequencing words and tenses to clearly convey the chronological order of events. Proper vocabulary choice and expressive body language can help engage listeners and make the anecdote more enjoyable to share.

Uploaded by

Rana Issa
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
259 views2 pages

Telling A Story or An Anecdote

This document provides guidance on how to tell short stories or anecdotes in English. It recommends starting with phrases like "That reminds me" or "Did I ever tell you about" and keeping stories brief while using sequencing words and tenses to clearly convey the chronological order of events. Proper vocabulary choice and expressive body language can help engage listeners and make the anecdote more enjoyable to share.

Uploaded by

Rana Issa
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

Telling a story or an anecdote

A useful skill in English is to be able to tell a story or an anecdote. Anecdotes are


short stories about something that happened to you or to someone you know.
How to start

Traditional stories often start with the phrase “Once upon a time”. However, if you
are going to tell your story after someone else has already spoken, you can say
something like:

“That reminds me!”


“Did I ever tell you about…”
“Hearing your story reminds me of when…”
“Something similar happened to me….”

How to tell your story

First of all, your story should be quite short. Try to keep it grammatically simple as
well, so that it is easy to follow.

Make it easy for the listener to understand by using sequencing and linking words:

Sequencing words
These words show the chronological sequence of events.

“First of all, I (packed my suitcase).”


“Secondly, I …. (made sure I had all my documents)”
“Previously (before that) ….. I changed some money.”
“Then… I (called a taxi for the airport)”
“Later (on)… (when we were stuck in traffic, I realised…)”
“But before all that… (I had double checked my reservation)”
“Finally… (I arrived at the wrong check-in desk at the wrong airport for a flight that
didn’t go until the next day)”

Linking words
Use these words to link your ideas for the listener. Linking words can be used to
show reason, result, contrasting information, additional information, and to
summarise.

“I booked a flight because….”


“As a result, I was late…”
“Although I had a reservation, I hadn’t checked the airport name.”
“I made sure I had an up-to-date passport and I also took along my driving licence.”
“In short, I had made a complete mess of the holiday.”
Tenses

We can use a variety of tenses to tell stories and anecdotes. Jokes are often in the
present tense:

“A man walks into a bar and orders a beer.”

However, we generally use past forms to talk about past events. If you tell your
story in chronological order, you can use the past simple:

“I double checked my reservation. I packed my suitcase, and then I called a taxi.”

Use the past continuous to describe activities in progress at the time of your story,
or to describe the background.

“The sun was shining and it was a beautiful day. We were driving along the
motorway quite steadily until we suddenly saw in front of us the warning lights to
slow down. We were heading towards a huge tailback.”

Sometimes, you might want to avoid telling your story as one chronological event
after the other. You can use the past perfect (simple and continuous) to add more
interest to your story by talking about events that happened before the events in your
story:

“I double-checked my reservation, which I had made three days previously.”

“I wanted to visit some friends who had been living in France for the last five years.”

Vocabulary

Try to use a wide range of words to make your story more interesting. Remember
that you can “exaggerate” when you tell a story, so instead of using words like “nice”
or “bad”, experiment with more interesting words, such as “beautiful”, “fabulous”,
“wonderful”, “horrible”, “awful” or “terrible”.

Finally – remember that you are telling a story – not giving a lecture. Look at the
people listening, and try to “involve” them in the story or anecdote. Keep eye contact,
use the right intonation and try to make your face expressive. You might also want to
try practising a few anecdotes in the mirror before “going live”. Have fun!

You might also like

pFad - Phonifier reborn

Pfad - The Proxy pFad of © 2024 Garber Painting. All rights reserved.

Note: This service is not intended for secure transactions such as banking, social media, email, or purchasing. Use at your own risk. We assume no liability whatsoever for broken pages.


Alternative Proxies:

Alternative Proxy

pFad Proxy

pFad v3 Proxy

pFad v4 Proxy