APPLEBEE’S SIX LEVELS (NARRATIVE STRUCTURE ANALYSIS)

APPLEBEE’S SIX LEVELS

Analyzing fictional stories, personal anecdotes

2-5 year olds with limited narrative skills

CENTERING

→ when parts of a story revolve around a central idea

→ similarity: perceptually observed attributes (actions, characters, scenes, situations)

→ complementarity: abstract, logical attributes (members of a class or events linked by cause-effect)

CHAINING

→ when a story develops a sense of time

→ temporal or logical order (events that lead directly from one to another)

2 YEARS OLD

HEAPS AGE?

HEAPS

→ earliest prenarrative structure

→ collections of unrelated ideas

→ no relationship or organization

→ child switched topics freely 

→ present progressive/tense 

→ no centering, no chaining

2-3 YEARS OLD

SEQUENCES AGE?

SEQUENCES 

→ parts of the story are linked together by arbitrary commonalities; no common characteristics

→ usually no ending 

→ there is centering (similarity)

→ no chaining

3-4 YEARS OLD

PRIMITIVE NARRATIVES AGE

PRIMITIVE NARRATIVES

→ macrostructure has a central character, topic, or setting 

→ event follow from a central core, but no true plot

→ child interprets or predicts events 

→ recognition and labeling 

→ there is centering (complementarity)

→ no chaining

4-4.5 YEARS OLD 

UNFOCUSED CHAINS AGE

UNFOCUSED CHAINS

→ no central character or topic

→ no plot or story theme 

→ sequence of events present; no consistent character or theme

→ events are linked in a logical or cause-effect relationships

→ seldom produced by children 

→ no centering 

→ there is chaining

5 YEARS OLD 

FOCUSED CHAINS AGE

FOCUSED CHAINS 

→ macrostructure: cental character and logical sequence of events

→ no strong plot and weak or no ending

→ characters and actions seldom lead to attainment of goal 

→ there is centering (similarity)

→ there is chaining

6-7 YEARS OLD

TRUE NARRATIVES AGE

TRUE NARRATIVES

→ true plot, character development, sequence of events

→ focused on an incident with problems being resolved at the end 

→ intentions or goals of characters are dependent on attributes and feelings 

→ there is centering (complementarity) 

→ there is chaining

7-11 YEARS OLD

NARRATIVE SUMMARIES AGE

NARRATIVE SUMMARIES

→ begin to categorize stories as funny, exciting, scary 

→ developed skill in considering the entire story

11-12 YEARS OLD

COMPLEX NARRATIVES AGE

COMPLEX NARRATIVES

→ narratives contain multiple embedded narrative structures

13-15 YEARS OLD

NARRATIVE ANALYSIS AGE

NARRATIVE ANALYSIS

→ adept at analyzing stories and its elements

16+ YEARS OLD

GENERALIZATION AGE

GENERALIZATION

→ generalize the story’s meaning, formulate abstract statement about the message or theme of the story and focus on their reaction to the story 

→ reaction papers, reflection papers