USING DESCRIPTIVE DETAILS!

Learning Target: Varies Word Choice

They make your writing interesting!

Using descriptive details SHOW readers…

FEEL what the noun feels like (hot/cold)

SMELL the smells in the sentence (strong/fresh)

TASTE the food (sweet/sour)

SEE (blue/shiny)

HEAR (loud/rumbling/quiet)

…everything that you write about!

1. They describe a person, place, or a thing. They describe NOUNS.

The slimy green toad hopped on the gravel.

Do you like this magenta dress?

I am never going on that fast rollercoaster again!

Tohickon Valley is a friendly place to be.

2. They tell you how many.

I have many pairs of shoes.

I have three loaves of bread in my pantry.

There are only a few bites left!

Will you buy some popcorn before the movie?

In your writing…

Whenever you see a subject, try to SPICE it up with adjectives! You can use your spicy packets, or look in a thesaurus to help you! Otherwise, your writing will be boring!

SHOW ME…DON’T TELL ME!!!

REVIEW!

A sentence must have a…

Capital letterPunctuation: (period, question mark, exclamation

point)SUBJECTPREDICATE

Example: The Eagles won the game.

Although that is a sentence, it is a boring one! I want to use my senses! I want to see a picture in

my mind…

Talk with a partner. How can I make that sentence more interesting?

HINT: Locate the nouns. Can you describe them better?

The Eagles won the game.

The Eagles won the game.

Subject Predicate

Adjective

What kind?

Adjective:

Where?When?

The teacher spoke

Calm

Happy

Enthusiastic

Strict

Intelligent

funny

during gym today

as the bell rang

after the students were seated

This is more descriptive, and I can still understand it.

Can you identify all the adjectives?

The kind-hearted teacher whispered to her noisy students in the library.

WHOA! WAY TOO MANY ADJECTIVES…

The kind-hearted, caring, loving, nice teacher whispered to her students in the library by the bookshelves.

What would our world be like without adjectives? WATCH!

This is a paragraph taken from our read aloud, A Series of Unfortunate Events:

The children looked from the well-scrubbed house of Justice Strauss to the dilapidated one next door. The bricks were stained with soot and grime. There were only two small windows, which were closed with the shades drawn even though it was a nice day. Rising

above the windows was a tall and dirty tower that tilted slightly to the left. The front door needed to be

repainted, and carved in the middle of it was an image of an eye. The entire building sagged to the side, like a

crooked tooth.

All the adjectives have been removed. Look at all the information that has been lost!

The children looked from the house of Justice Strauss to the one next door. The bricks were stained with soot and grime. There were only windows, which were closed with the shades

drawn even though it was a day. Rising above the windows was a tower that tilted. The door

needed to be repainted, and carved in the middle of it was an image of an eye. The entire

building sagged to the side.

Complete the declarative sentence with adjectives in your writing journals! Remember,

SHOW me…don’t TELL me! Use your spicy packets or your thesauruses!

The food was bad.

Many spiders moved.