Narrative Know-How

A Fresh Approach to Support Comprehension and Craft in the K–6 Classroom
Trevor Andrew Bryan
Corwin Literacy
Narrative Know-How
August 2025 | 224 pages | Corwin
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eBook
ISBN: 9781071926253
Available from January 0001
Paperback
ISBN: 9781071941683
Available from September 2025

Description

Teach your students to grasp the structure of narratives with this simple, yet powerful approach! 

Teaching text structure has never been easier or more engaging. Narrative Know-How: A Fresh Approach to Support Comprehension and Craft in the K–6 Classroom equips educators with innovative tools to help students understand the structure of stories, improving both their reading comprehension and their ability to craft compelling narratives. Through his unique Mood Structures strategy, Trevor Bryan offers a simple yet powerful way for students to connect with fiction and nonfiction texts alike. Whether you're aiming to boost engagement, make complex ideas more accessible, or bring joy back to your literacy lessons, this book delivers.

Designed to help young readers and writers thrive, this resource focuses on actionable strategies and practical lessons tested in real classrooms. Teachers will gain the tools they need to develop students’ narrative comprehension, improve written expression, and foster critical thinking skills.

Offering a fresh approach to comprehension and narrative writing, this research-backed book

  • Provides a proven instructional sequence that connects reading and writing to enable students to seamlessly build comprehension and composition skills
  • Addresses key narrative elements such as mood, symbolism, and themes in both reading and writing through 20 classroom-tested lessons
  • Helps students understand narrative principles with more than 20 extensive mentor texts examples and accompanying deconstructions
  • Includes original illustrations from the award-winning author-illustrator, Jarrett Lerner, visual tools, graphic organizers and guided response sheets that enhance engagement and make the approach easy to access for every learner

Trevor Bryan’s groundbreaking instructional strategies make literacy instruction purposeful, practical, and fun. With Narrative Know-How, educators will inspire their students to think critically, write skillfully, and read with deeper insight.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments

About the Author

About the Author

PART 1: Small Steps into Story

  • Introduction
  • Foundations of This Approach
  • Chapter One: Teach Text Structure with Mood Structure
  • Traditional Text Structure Teaching
  • A Bottom-Up Approach
  • The Solution: The Mood Structures
  • Mood Structure: A Closer Look
  • Chapter Two: Determining Mood as a Critical Reading Skill
  • How Moods Show Up in Stories
  • The Access Lenses in Action
  • Chapter Three: Using Mood and Mood Structure to Bolster Comprehension During Reading
  • What Do We Want Students to Pay Attention To?
  • Using the Three Key Questions to Set a Purpose for Reading
  • Chapter Four: Using the Mood Structures for Summarizing and Identifying Themes After Reading
  • Using Moods and Mood Structures to Lean Into Symbolism
  • Using the Terms Helpers and Harmers to Simplify Symbolism
  • Chapter Five: An Instructional Sequence that Connects Reading and Writing
  • Our Instructional Sequence
  • Clearly Connecting the Reading and Writing Connection
  • Research on Integrating Reading and Writing Instruction

PART 2: Lessons

  • Introduction
  • Lesson Layout
  • The Reading Lessons
  • The Very First Lesson: Checking for the Understanding of Negative and Positive Moods
  • Reading Lesson 1: Noticing Mood Structures When Reading
  • Reading Lesson 2: Look for the Helpers
  • Reading Lesson 3: Noticing Moods When They Are Directly Stated
  • Reading Lesson 4: Using the Access Lenses to Infer Moods When Moods Are Shown
  • Reading Lesson 5: Introducing the Concept of Harmers
  • Reading Lesson 6: Three Key Questions That Readers Should Always Be Asking
  • Reading Lesson 7: Making Predictions
  • Reading Lesson 8: Making Text-to-Text Connections Based on Mood or Mood Structure
  • Reading Lesson 9: Harmers Turned Helpers
  • Reading Lesson 10: Generating Themes Through Moods and the Reasons for Those Moods
  • Reading Lesson 11: Helpers and Harmers as Symbols
  • Reading Lesson 12: The Three Ingredients of Story
  • Reading Lesson 13: Using the Three Ingredients of Story to Summarize
  • Reading Lesson 14: Using the Three Ingredients of Story and the Mood Structures to Summarize
  • The Writing Lessons
  • Writing Lesson 1: Generating Workable Story Ideas
  • Writing Lesson 2: A Reading and Writing Lesson to Help Students Generate Story Ideas
  • Writing Lesson 3: Showing the Mood With the Access Lenses
  • Writing Lesson 4: Including Inner Thoughts
  • Writing Lesson 5: Using Dialogue to Help Present Moods, Reasons for the Moods, and Events
  • Four Versions of a Story
  • Teaching the Opening of “The Catch”: Version 1–4

PART 3: Starter Texts and Full-Text Deconstructions

  • Introduction
  • Starter Texts
  • Full-Text Deconstructions
  • Finding Your Own Resources
  • THE STARTER TEXTS
  • “Playing Outside”
  • “Reading Time”
  • “Cooper” (Five-Panel Comic)
  • “Cooper” (Six-Panel Comic)
  • The Kissing Hand
  • Mercy Watson to the Rescue
  • “One Sad Simba”
  • Henry’s Freedom Box
  • Thank You, Mr. Falker
  • Mr. Wayne’s Masterpiece
  • Stone Angel
  • Each Kindness
  • Frindle
  • “The First Day”
  • FULL-TEXT DECONSTRUCTIONS
  • The Rain Came Down
  • The Dot
  • Ish
  • “Taco Head”
  • The Great Penguin Rescue
  • “A Howlin’ Success”
  • Blank Deconstruction Form
  • References
  • Index

Description

Teach your students to grasp the structure of narratives with this simple, yet powerful approach! 

Teaching text structure has never been easier or more engaging. Narrative Know-How: A Fresh Approach to Support Comprehension and Craft in the K–6 Classroom equips educators with innovative tools to help students understand the structure of stories, improving both their reading comprehension and their ability to craft compelling narratives. Through his unique Mood Structures strategy, Trevor Bryan offers a simple yet powerful way for students to connect with fiction and nonfiction texts alike. Whether you're aiming to boost engagement, make complex ideas more accessible, or bring joy back to your literacy lessons, this book delivers.

Designed to help young readers and writers thrive, this resource focuses on actionable strategies and practical lessons tested in real classrooms. Teachers will gain the tools they need to develop students’ narrative comprehension, improve written expression, and foster critical thinking skills.

Offering a fresh approach to comprehension and narrative writing, this research-backed book

  • Provides a proven instructional sequence that connects reading and writing to enable students to seamlessly build comprehension and composition skills
  • Addresses key narrative elements such as mood, symbolism, and themes in both reading and writing through 20 classroom-tested lessons
  • Helps students understand narrative principles with more than 20 extensive mentor texts examples and accompanying deconstructions
  • Includes original illustrations from the award-winning author-illustrator, Jarrett Lerner, visual tools, graphic organizers and guided response sheets that enhance engagement and make the approach easy to access for every learner

Trevor Bryan’s groundbreaking instructional strategies make literacy instruction purposeful, practical, and fun. With Narrative Know-How, educators will inspire their students to think critically, write skillfully, and read with deeper insight.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments

About the Author

About the Author

PART 1: Small Steps into Story

  • Introduction
  • Foundations of This Approach
  • Chapter One: Teach Text Structure with Mood Structure
  • Traditional Text Structure Teaching
  • A Bottom-Up Approach
  • The Solution: The Mood Structures
  • Mood Structure: A Closer Look
  • Chapter Two: Determining Mood as a Critical Reading Skill
  • How Moods Show Up in Stories
  • The Access Lenses in Action
  • Chapter Three: Using Mood and Mood Structure to Bolster Comprehension During Reading
  • What Do We Want Students to Pay Attention To?
  • Using the Three Key Questions to Set a Purpose for Reading
  • Chapter Four: Using the Mood Structures for Summarizing and Identifying Themes After Reading
  • Using Moods and Mood Structures to Lean Into Symbolism
  • Using the Terms Helpers and Harmers to Simplify Symbolism
  • Chapter Five: An Instructional Sequence that Connects Reading and Writing
  • Our Instructional Sequence
  • Clearly Connecting the Reading and Writing Connection
  • Research on Integrating Reading and Writing Instruction

PART 2: Lessons

  • Introduction
  • Lesson Layout
  • The Reading Lessons
  • The Very First Lesson: Checking for the Understanding of Negative and Positive Moods
  • Reading Lesson 1: Noticing Mood Structures When Reading
  • Reading Lesson 2: Look for the Helpers
  • Reading Lesson 3: Noticing Moods When They Are Directly Stated
  • Reading Lesson 4: Using the Access Lenses to Infer Moods When Moods Are Shown
  • Reading Lesson 5: Introducing the Concept of Harmers
  • Reading Lesson 6: Three Key Questions That Readers Should Always Be Asking
  • Reading Lesson 7: Making Predictions
  • Reading Lesson 8: Making Text-to-Text Connections Based on Mood or Mood Structure
  • Reading Lesson 9: Harmers Turned Helpers
  • Reading Lesson 10: Generating Themes Through Moods and the Reasons for Those Moods
  • Reading Lesson 11: Helpers and Harmers as Symbols
  • Reading Lesson 12: The Three Ingredients of Story
  • Reading Lesson 13: Using the Three Ingredients of Story to Summarize
  • Reading Lesson 14: Using the Three Ingredients of Story and the Mood Structures to Summarize
  • The Writing Lessons
  • Writing Lesson 1: Generating Workable Story Ideas
  • Writing Lesson 2: A Reading and Writing Lesson to Help Students Generate Story Ideas
  • Writing Lesson 3: Showing the Mood With the Access Lenses
  • Writing Lesson 4: Including Inner Thoughts
  • Writing Lesson 5: Using Dialogue to Help Present Moods, Reasons for the Moods, and Events
  • Four Versions of a Story
  • Teaching the Opening of “The Catch”: Version 1–4

PART 3: Starter Texts and Full-Text Deconstructions

  • Introduction
  • Starter Texts
  • Full-Text Deconstructions
  • Finding Your Own Resources
  • THE STARTER TEXTS
  • “Playing Outside”
  • “Reading Time”
  • “Cooper” (Five-Panel Comic)
  • “Cooper” (Six-Panel Comic)
  • The Kissing Hand
  • Mercy Watson to the Rescue
  • “One Sad Simba”
  • Henry’s Freedom Box
  • Thank You, Mr. Falker
  • Mr. Wayne’s Masterpiece
  • Stone Angel
  • Each Kindness
  • Frindle
  • “The First Day”
  • FULL-TEXT DECONSTRUCTIONS
  • The Rain Came Down
  • The Dot
  • Ish
  • “Taco Head”
  • The Great Penguin Rescue
  • “A Howlin’ Success”
  • Blank Deconstruction Form
  • References
  • Index
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Narrative Know-How

A Fresh Approach to Support Comprehension and Craft in the K–6 Classroom

Trevor Andrew Bryan
Cancel Print

August 2025 | 224 pages | Corwin

Format Published Date ISBN Price
Paperback 17/08/2023 9781071941683 $37.95
Lifetime 01/02/2026 9781071926253 $35.00

Teach your students to grasp the structure of narratives with this simple, yet powerful approach! 

Teaching text structure has never been easier or more engaging. Narrative Know-How: A Fresh Approach to Support Comprehension and Craft in the K–6 Classroom equips educators with innovative tools to help students understand the structure of stories, improving both their reading comprehension and their ability to craft compelling narratives. Through his unique Mood Structures strategy, Trevor Bryan offers a simple yet powerful way for students to connect with fiction and nonfiction texts alike. Whether you're aiming to boost engagement, make complex ideas more accessible, or bring joy back to your literacy lessons, this book delivers.

Designed to help young readers and writers thrive, this resource focuses on actionable strategies and practical lessons tested in real classrooms. Teachers will gain the tools they need to develop students’ narrative comprehension, improve written expression, and foster critical thinking skills.

Offering a fresh approach to comprehension and narrative writing, this research-backed book

  • Provides a proven instructional sequence that connects reading and writing to enable students to seamlessly build comprehension and composition skills
  • Addresses key narrative elements such as mood, symbolism, and themes in both reading and writing through 20 classroom-tested lessons
  • Helps students understand narrative principles with more than 20 extensive mentor texts examples and accompanying deconstructions
  • Includes original illustrations from the award-winning author-illustrator, Jarrett Lerner, visual tools, graphic organizers and guided response sheets that enhance engagement and make the approach easy to access for every learner

Trevor Bryan’s groundbreaking instructional strategies make literacy instruction purposeful, practical, and fun. With Narrative Know-How, educators will inspire their students to think critically, write skillfully, and read with deeper insight.


Table Of Contents:

  • Acknowledgments
  • About the Author
  • PART 1: Small Steps into Story
  • Introduction
  • Foundations of This Approach
  • Chapter One: Teach Text Structure with Mood Structure
  • Traditional Text Structure Teaching
  • A Bottom-Up Approach
  • The Solution: The Mood Structures
  • Mood Structure: A Closer Look
  • Chapter Two: Determining Mood as a Critical Reading Skill
  • How Moods Show Up in Stories
  • The Access Lenses in Action
  • Chapter Three: Using Mood and Mood Structure to Bolster Comprehension During Reading
  • What Do We Want Students to Pay Attention To?
  • Using the Three Key Questions to Set a Purpose for Reading
  • Chapter Four: Using the Mood Structures for Summarizing and Identifying Themes After Reading
  • Using Moods and Mood Structures to Lean Into Symbolism
  • Using the Terms Helpers and Harmers to Simplify Symbolism
  • Chapter Five: An Instructional Sequence that Connects Reading and Writing
  • Our Instructional Sequence
  • Clearly Connecting the Reading and Writing Connection
  • Research on Integrating Reading and Writing Instruction
  • PART 2: Lessons
  • Introduction
  • Lesson Layout
  • The Reading Lessons
  • The Very First Lesson: Checking for the Understanding of Negative and Positive Moods
  • Reading Lesson 1: Noticing Mood Structures When Reading
  • Reading Lesson 2: Look for the Helpers
  • Reading Lesson 3: Noticing Moods When They Are Directly Stated
  • Reading Lesson 4: Using the Access Lenses to Infer Moods When Moods Are Shown
  • Reading Lesson 5: Introducing the Concept of Harmers
  • Reading Lesson 6: Three Key Questions That Readers Should Always Be Asking
  • Reading Lesson 7: Making Predictions
  • Reading Lesson 8: Making Text-to-Text Connections Based on Mood or Mood Structure
  • Reading Lesson 9: Harmers Turned Helpers
  • Reading Lesson 10: Generating Themes Through Moods and the Reasons for Those Moods
  • Reading Lesson 11: Helpers and Harmers as Symbols
  • Reading Lesson 12: The Three Ingredients of Story
  • Reading Lesson 13: Using the Three Ingredients of Story to Summarize
  • Reading Lesson 14: Using the Three Ingredients of Story and the Mood Structures to Summarize
  • The Writing Lessons
  • Writing Lesson 1: Generating Workable Story Ideas
  • Writing Lesson 2: A Reading and Writing Lesson to Help Students Generate Story Ideas
  • Writing Lesson 3: Showing the Mood With the Access Lenses
  • Writing Lesson 4: Including Inner Thoughts
  • Writing Lesson 5: Using Dialogue to Help Present Moods, Reasons for the Moods, and Events
  • Four Versions of a Story
  • Teaching the Opening of “The Catch”: Version 1–4
  • PART 3: Starter Texts and Full-Text Deconstructions
  • Introduction
  • Starter Texts
  • Full-Text Deconstructions
  • Finding Your Own Resources
  • THE STARTER TEXTS
  • “Playing Outside”
  • “Reading Time”
  • “Cooper” (Five-Panel Comic)
  • “Cooper” (Six-Panel Comic)
  • The Kissing Hand
  • Mercy Watson to the Rescue
  • “One Sad Simba”
  • Henry’s Freedom Box
  • Thank You, Mr. Falker
  • Mr. Wayne’s Masterpiece
  • Stone Angel
  • Each Kindness
  • Frindle
  • “The First Day”
  • FULL-TEXT DECONSTRUCTIONS
  • The Rain Came Down
  • The Dot
  • Ish
  • “Taco Head”
  • The Great Penguin Rescue
  • “A Howlin’ Success”
  • Blank Deconstruction Form
  • References
  • Index

Recent Product Reviews:

"Trevor Bryan’s Narrative Know-How is an essential resource for any elementary classroom, offering a straightforward, bottom-up approach that elevates both reading comprehension and an understanding of author’s craft. With a focus on Mood Structures, reading comprehension becomes visually accessible for students and teachers alike, creating a seamless connection between reading and writing. When students have a clear mental representation of text structure, they can easily engage with key components of any narrative piece, both fiction and nonfiction, in order to set a purpose for reading, make predictions, infer, summarize, and draw conclusions about themes and symbolism. The included scaffolded response and planning sheets ensure students are set up for success in both analyzing texts and crafting their own narratives. Backed by heavy research, this approach can be used with any literacy program, bringing joy to teaching and learning. I can’t wait to plan with teachers using this book!"
Whitney La Rocca, author and literacy consultant
"Trevor Bryan’s Narrative Know-How: A Fresh Approach to Support Comprehension and Craft in the K–6 Classroom shows how using a small set of high-utility tools across units, grades, and settings can provide on-ramps to high-level thinking skills across the literacy block. By connecting his classroom-tested tools, including Mood Structures and Access Lenses, to recent and robust research around the sciences of reading, Narrative Know-How prepares classroom teachers and instructional specialists to simplify and streamline joyful literacy learning."
Pam Koutrakos, pre-K–8 instructional coach and author of Mentor Texts That Multitask: A Less-Is-More Approach to Integrated Literacy Instruction, Word Study That Sticks: Best Practices K–6, and The Wo
"Fans of Trevor’s first book, The Art of Comprehension, will find new tools and inspiration here. Mood remains meaningful, but the author offers a bigger and bolder set of intentions. Narrative Know-How paves the way for composition as readers are introduced to four essential story principles and practical strategies for applying them."
Angela Stockman, instructor; executive director of distance education, Department of Education; Daemen University
"Narrative Know-How is more than a professional development book. It is an insightful and engaging guide that transforms how we think, talk, and teach stories. With clear strategies, thought-provoking lessons, and supporting tools that stretch across all levels and abilities, this book is a game-changer for educators looking to lift their students’ critical thinking."
Jill Villecco, M.Ed., reading specialist
"Trevor Bryan has a gift for making complex ideas simple, accessible, and joyful. His work has profoundly transformed my teaching, reshaping how I understand stories and, as a result, reshaping how my students comprehend and craft stories. After engaging with Trevor’s work, you’ll find yourself viewing every story through the lens of mood—it’s the powerful missing piece that educators didn’t know they were searching for."
Shaina Brenner, educator and Milken Educator Award recipient

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