The Monster Draw Game

Adjectives, adjectives, adjectives!! They paint such important pictures in our minds. Colors, numbers, shapes, and sizes.... we can't clearly envision an object without adjectives.


My Writers' Workshop students celebrated Halloween last week with the Monster Draw Game.  Here is how you play:

1. Draw a monster and have fun with the art work.

2. Write a description that is incredibly detailed. Describe every aspect of your picture with size, shape, color, and number adjectives.

3. Exchange your descriptions with a partner.

4. Attempt to draw their monster, while they draw yours.

5. The winners' pictures will look almost identical, because the description will be so vivid and easy to follow.

When the game was over, the classes (and a few parents, too!) voted on the best matches.   I promised the winners they would be published on the blog, so here they are!

I am proud of my 3rd graders, Kelsey and Serena!  Kelsey wrote the following description and was so careful with her colors and sizes that it is no wonder these monsters are so similar!

My monster is an "OK" size and is pine green.  It is oval shaped.  It has one medium bright yellow nose.  It has one blue eye, a big red mouth, and a green tongue.  It has three blue hairs on each side, and green curvy arms and three curvy legs.

Here is how Serena drew it!

4th grader Sulwen wrote in beautiful detail.  Everything from head to toe is vividly described.  4th grader Vionna used her excellent reading skills to create the twin monster!

The monster has a triangle shaped body.  The body is green, but remember to leave a medium sized circle in the center.  The circle is the face, and is sky blue.  On the face are three eyes.  The eyes are arranged one on the top and two on the bottom, triangle shaped.  They are at the top of the circle.  There is also a round orange circle in the middle of the circle as a nose.  The nose is about the size of the eraser on your mechanical pencil.  The mouth is a half circle shape that is just a red line.  On the right side of the mouth, there is a little red tongue with a black vertical line going through it.  On the bottom of the trianglular body, there are four legs.  They are skinny and have little round balls on the bottom as feet.  The legs and feet are also sky blue.  On the top of the head are antenna.  They are right on the point of the top of the triangle.  There are two antennae; they are also skinny and have little balls at the top of the skinny lined part.  The antennae are also sky blue.  The monster is now done.  Good luck on drawing it!

And here is Vionna's!

Abby (4th grade) is appearing on the blog with this game for the third time!  She is an amazingly thorough and descriptive writer.  She also does a great job organizing her work into paragraphs, even under the time pressure in our game.  Her super reader 5th grade partner, Savannah, had no trouble making her adorable monster's twin!

My monster is shaped like a starfish.  His body is dark purple.  His bright orange mouth has a little orange tongue sticking out on your right.  Directly above his mouth he has two big eyes, outlined with black.  The monster's left pupil is small and black.  It is close to the bottom of his left eye.  His right pupil is small and black, and is close to the top of his right eye.


My monster has a big teal bow tie right below his mouth.  On your right he has a light green surfboard with the words "SURFER" on it.  "SURFER" is outlined in black pen, with peach on the inside.


Behind my monster, there are five little blue waves, then a big blue wave, then four little ones, and then a medium-sized blue wave all near the top of the paper.  Right on top of the water, on your left, is a yellow sun on the corner.  The sun has wavy sun rays in yellow.  The water behind him is bright blue.  I hope you think my monster is very adorable!

Here is Savannah's: