Biographies are big business. Whether in book form or Hollywood biopics, the lives of the famous, and sometimes not so famous, fascinate us.

While it’s true that almost all biographies are about people who are in the public eye, generally the subject is less well known. Largely though, well-known or not, the person who is written about has led a life that's in some way incredible.

While your students will most likely have a basic understanding of what a biography is, it’s price taking a little time earlier than they put pen to paper to tease out a crystal clear definition of exactly what a biography is.

Merely put, a biography is an account of somebody’s life written by someone else. While there is a genre known as fictional biography, for the most part, biographies are by definition nonfiction.

Usually speaking, biographies provide an account of the topic’s life from the earliest days of their childhood, right up to the current day or their death, if the subject is deceased.

The job of a biography is more than just to outline the naked information of an individual’s life.

Slightly than just listing the fundamental particulars of their upbringing, hobbies, schooling, work, relationships, and death, a well-written biography must also paint an image of the topic’s personality and as well as their experience of life.

Before students begin writing a biography, they’ll need to have a firm grasp of the main options of the genre. A good way of initially determining how well they understand these essential elements of the genre is by asking them to compile a checklist.

At a minimum, their checklists should include the items below. Be sure to assist them fill in any gaps before moving on to the writing process.

The aim of a biography is to provide an account of someone’s life
Tense: Written up to now tense (though ending might shift to the current/future tense)

Structure:

● Written within the third person

● Opens with a powerful hook to grab the reader’s attention

● Usually written in chronological order

● Uses time connectives

● Covers: childhood, upbringing, education, influences, accomplishments, relationships, and many others – everything that helps the reader to understand the person

● Provides particular details about individuals, places, occasions, instances, dates, and so on

● Reflects on how events shaped the topic

● May embody some related images with captions

● Concludes with what the subject is doing now or what their legacy will be.



Practical Activity:

As soon as your students have compiled a comprehensive checklist of the main options of a biography, allow them to use it to assess some biographies from the library using the checklist.

When students have assessed a choice of biographies, take some time as a class to discuss them. You can base the discussion around the following prompts:

● Which biographies covered all of the criteria from their checklist?

● Which biographies didn’t?

● Which biography was essentially the most readable by way of structure?

● Which biography do you think was the least well structured? How would you improve this?

Taking the time to look at how different writers have interpreted the form will help students to internalize the necessary criteria before making an attempt to produce a biography themselves.

Once students have a clear understanding of the primary options of the biography, they’re ready to start work on writing a biography.

When the time does come to put pen to paper, be certain they’re armed with the following top ideas to help ensure they’re as well prepared as possible.

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