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Proverbs often tell a story. Sometimes the characters and action are included, like "The early bird catches the worm," while other proverbs allude to a story, giving the moral that goes with the story at the end, like "Slow and steady wins the race" as the moral of the story of The Tortoise and the Hare.
You can invent your own "proverbs" too. For example, I told a story about Wisahketchahk in my first presentation. That story could be told in 6 words (assuming people know the story already!) this way: Dancing with Wisahketchahk? Open your eyes!
Or another way: Foolish ducks danced with eyes closed.

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Probably the most famous 6-word story (no, it's not by Hemingway). Like many 6-word stories, it's more like a clue than a story. You, the reader, must imagine the story.

For Sale:
Baby shoes,
never worn.

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Padlets: A Fun and Powerful Writing Space

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Padlets: A Fun and Powerful Writing Space

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I am excited and honored to be presenting at Manisha Khetarpal's microlearning continuing education project for Maskwacis Cultural College on Thursday, March 2 2023, Noon-1PM Mountain Time on the subject of 6-WORD STORIES.
To view this Padlet as a presentation, click here to switch to Slide view (or, on your phone, just expand a post to full-screen view).
To register for the event, use this registration form.

And please feel free to add comments or ask questions here at the padlet before, during, and after the event. Each post/slide has its own comment box. You can also contact me by email laurakgibbs@gmail.com or find me at Twitter @OnlineCrsLady (Online Course Lady). The conversation can go on beyond the scheduled workshop: I hope it will! :-)

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If you are curious about the two previous presentations I've done as part of this series, you can find them both here:
Tiny Writing for Microlearning ... which was about 100-word stories along with stories shorter than 100
Padlets: A Fun and Powerful Writing Space ... so if you are curious about this Padlet, you can learn more there!

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For even MORE examples of 6-word stories, check out this slidedeck from a presentation I made to a constrained writing group: 6-Word Stories.
That presentation also has the names and sources for the stories I have included in this Padlet.

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You can also riff on an existing proverb or cliche so that your 6-word creation gets its punch from the way you have changed the original proverb. Proverb scholar Wolfgang Mieder calls these anti-proverbs. This motivational poster for spawning salmon is from the Washington State Dept. of Natural Resources.
Some more:
Absence makes the heart go wander.
Lazy worm outwitted the early bird.
Torched the haystack; found the needle.

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I cannot say enough good things about Doug Weller's Six Word Wonder Workbook: Write Your Own Six Word Stories, Poems, Memoirs, and Jokes.
And Doug Weller practies what he preaches; he's published several books of his own 6-word stories; find out more at his website: DougWeller.net.

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Smith Magazine has a website dedicated to its 6-word memoir projects: SixWordMemoirs.com. You will find lots of memoirs there, along with free teaching guides. They have also published a series of 6-word memoir books.

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There are several different ways to add your own 6-word stories to this Padlet! If you want, include your name with your story, or you can just post your story anonmously. It's all good!
* If you want to use an image with your story, then CREATE A NEW POST by clicking on the plus button at the bottom of this column. That opens up the post editor so you can upload an image and type your story.
* If you are just writing a story, you can add that story as a COMMENT on a post. You can add a story commenting on this post, or you can scan down the column here for some different writing prompts to inspire your story.

To ADD A COMMENT, just type in the comment box and hit return when you're done.

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My favorite book from the SixWordMemoirs project is Six Words Fresh Off the Boat: Stories of Immigration, Identity, and Coming to America.
Here's a video that tells about the book and features many stories, together with their authors.... and yes, you will find celebrities interspersed here, along with everyday people you have never heard of. They all have stories!

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Six Words Fresh Off the Boat: Stories of Coming to America

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You can learn more about the 6-word memoir project from Smith Magazine in this NPR interview: Can You Tell Your Life Story In Exactly Six Words?

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I'm always glad to brainstorm about about short writing activities, including 6-word stories! You can find me at Twitter, @OnlineCrsLady, or email me at laurakgibbs@gmail.com.

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Like with anti-proverbs, you can create anti-stories, or what some people call "flipped" stories which play with an existing story.
Here are some more:
* In the rematch, Hare beat Tortoise.
* Woodsman on vacation. Dead Riding Hood.
* Betty Rubble left Barney... for Wilma.

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"Wait, you're pregnant how?" asked Joseph.

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A 6-word story can also allude to an old story, where the 6-word story gives the reader clues to connect it to the familiar story.
Here are some more:
* Wax wings. High hopes. Long fall.
* Snakes slither; Medusa hisses. Don't look!
* "Wolf!' cried the boy. "Really! REALLY!"

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Tom Gauld imagines the rest of the story in a series of 6-word statements, not tragic at all:

For Sale: baby shoes, never worn.
Don't worry, the baby is fine.
We just bought too many shoes.
It turns out that babies don't...
need to wear shoes that often.

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Some examples of 6-word memoirs from Six Words Fresh Off the Boat: Stories of Coming to America.

*Slowly forgetting my language, Sorry, Mom.
*How do I become "just American"?
*Grandpa works hard, earns Grandma's passage.
*Immigrant, writer, daughter, sister, mother, survivor.
*Learning English? Easy. Learning American: hard.
*Even Siri does not understand me.

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Filipino-American. I'm the hyphen in between.

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That's by Deidrene Crisanto in Six Words Fresh Off the Boat: Stories of Coming to America.

Here's a tiny rhyming 6-word poem:
Leaders lie.
Sons die.
Mothers cry.

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The story about the baby shoes has inspired many more such stories!
Some more:
* For Sale: Love letters, never opened.
* For Sale: Hemingway book, never opened.
* For Sale: Magic wand. Instructions vanished.

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That's from Maria Dolores Castillo in Six Words Fresh Off the Boat: Stories of Coming to America.

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Remember to use commas, dashes, ellipses, periods, exclamation marks, as all the punctuation can help bring life and drama to your 6-word story. There's no limit on the number of punctuation marks!
* Smoking my very last cigarette, again.
* Lock the doors before it's too —
* Saturday night. Music, food, wine — alone.
* If walls could talk —  “We do.”
* The reflection smiled and stepped through...
* Don't ask questions. Just run! NOW!

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6-word jokes are pretty much the shortest possible one-liners! A few more:
You can't get there from here.
Pay your exorcist! Don't get repossessed!
Illegally parked frogs get towed away.
A cat ate yarn; had mittens.
Claustrophobic astronauts just want more space.
The optimist drowned in half-full bathtub.

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Probably the most powerful punctuation marks for your stories are quotation marks. When you put quotation marks around the words of the story, that conjures up a dialogue, with the reader imagining who else is part of the conversation and what's going on during that conversation.
Here are some more where it's all about the implied conversation:
* "Goodbye, Mission Control. Thanks for trying."
* "Does Santa love rich kids more?"
* "Yes, Netflix. I'm still watching. Alone."
* "What do you mean 'Hello, Dad!'?"
* “Passengers, this isn't your captain speaking.”
All-caps can be useful too!
* “No! Not THAT button, Mr. President!”
* “No. That's not MY missing foot.”
You can also use asterisks for sound effects:
* Try not to break my... *smash*

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You can also use direct speech plus some words about the speaker.
* "I do," he said, fingers crossed.
* “Your WIFE called,” hissed his wife.
You can also squeeze an actual dialogue into a 6-word story too as here:
“I will destroy this planet.”
“...Mum?”
And here:
“Hell seems okay.”
“Furnace is broken.”

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Here's a 6-word story in the form of an Onion headline:

NASA Panics After Asteroid Fires Back.

Having students write 6-word headlines for news stories is good practice, and it's fun to compare the different versions that people come up with.

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raccoon wearing a tie by a computer keyboard

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The #sixwordstory hashtag at Twitter can lead you to some great images that people have captioned with 6 words, and of course you can use image prompts for your students to write their own 6 word stories. Here are some responses to the raccoon:

*“I'll open a ticket for you.”
*“You want Shakespeare? Hire monkeys.”
*Never trust an after-hours copy editor.
*Day 215: They still haven't noticed.
*“Guardians just wasn't paying the bills.”
*Uh-oh: Guardians of the Tax Audit!
*"Okay, I emptied your trash folder."
*Still wearing masks in the office.
*"It's a living," the raccoon said.

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Some 6-word stories are just a sentence. No breaks, no pauses. Just a sentence.
* "Just overheard her arranging my murder."
* Warthogs and baboons argue about beauty.
* The immortals attended the last funeral.
* The last humans rattled their cages.
More often, though, the 6 words are broken up in some way to add some dramatic pacing to the story. I call these "acts," so you can have a story in 1 act (all 6 words as one statement), 2 acts, 3 acts, 4 acts, 5 acts, or even 6 acts. Examples below:

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Sometimes the two acts are separate sentences:
*Born a pawn. Died a queen.
*She worked hard. He drank harder.
*Pregnancy test: Positive. Boyfriend test: Negative...
The two sentences might be 3 words each, but the break could also be 4-2 as here:
*I met my soulmate. She didn't.
The two parts can also be separate clauses, but not actually separate sentences. There might be a comma between them, or ellipses, a dash, spaces, whatever works best for the story as you see it:
*Poacher outsmarted ranger, but not elephant.
* His first breath       was her last.
*Under the covers, over the monsters.

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Shots fired. Bard's dead. Divorce final.

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This is where you get a real sense of the elegance of 6 words, because it can be divided neatly into 3 sets of 2 words.
*Flat tire. Flight missed. Air crash.
*Nuclear winter. Frozen earth. Dig deep.
*One diamond. Two robbers. Three Rottweilers.
*Met her… fate intervened… tattoo remains.
*Breaking news: World peace! Humans extinct!
* Homework late. Dog hungry. Plan emerges.

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With 4 acts, you're going to have some one-word acts:
* Late. Speeding. Pulled over. Really late.
* Rain. Two strangers. One umbrella. Love.
*Leaves. Changes mind. Returns. She's gone.

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Grasshopper sang, played, mocked, begged... starved.

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With 5 acts, you're going to have all one-word acts except for just a single 2-word act, like in this Aesop's fable about The Ant and the Grasshopper.
Here's another one; this time the two-word act is at the end:
Scuba-diving.
Lost!
*suffocating*
Mermaids!
Never resurfaced.

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Now every act is just a single word!
Here are some more:
* Sticks. Spears. Swords. Guns. Nukes. Sticks.
* Single. Mingled. Laughed. Loved. Lied. Alone.
* Born. Preached. Inspired. Betrayed. Crucified. Resurrected.

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Pandora painting by Lawrence Alma-Tadema

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Pandora
I won't open it. I promise!

Some people believe 6-word stories should not have titles, but I believe in titles for the stories. The title is instead like a clue to decoding the story, like "Pandora" here. I'm also a fan of 6-word stories that have an illustration; more about that later. The title, like an illustration, can put the story into a context that helps the reader imagine the story more fully.

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December 20. Newly empty chairs haunt Christmas dinner.

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This 6-word story is powerful on its own. With the title, the author (one of my students) signals the context: the first Christmas of the COVID pandemic, December 2020, before we even had a vaccine.

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From #sixwordstory at Twitter. Write your story in a comment on this post:

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From #sixwordstory at Twitter.
Share your 6 words in a comment:

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Write a 6-word story that has something to do with the folktale of Jack and the Beanstalk; add your story in a comment. Or maybe you will be inspired to retell or otherwise twist some other famous fairy tale, folktale or fable!

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Write a 6-word story inspired by something you experienced during the pandemic.

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Write a 6-word story inspired by your favorite holiday.

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Write a 6-word story inspired by the most beautiful place you've ever been.
Leave your 6 words in a comment here, or if you want to include a picture of the place, create your own post — just click on the plus button at the bottom of this column, select "upload" to add a picture, and type your story in the post. Then hit "publish."

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I also wanted to add that the second part of a two-part series I wrote with Heather Kretschmer for MindBrainEd about tiny writing and the power of writing constraints is now available! (The second part just appeared in the March 2023 issue.)
You can also access the PDF here: The Power of Creative Constraints in Tiny Writing.

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Feel free to add here any kind of 6-word story that you want to share. :-)