Saturday, October 8, 2016

"Sunny Sentences:" How to Add Description to our Writing!

We are off to another fabulous start in "Budding Authors and Artists" (grades 1-3) and "Awesome Authors and Artists" (grades 3-6).  Our first assignment focused on the power of a single sentence.  Our job as writers is to paint a clear picture in our reader's mind; exactly what we want them to see.  How do we do that?  With……
~adjectives
~adverbs
~where phrases and clauses
~when phrases and clauses
~creative sentence starters

We started this assignment with a base sentence: a "boring sentence" that has the grammatical components to be a complete sentence, but lacks any description or excitement:
The sun shines.
 Step 2 was to add modifiers to our sentences, one at a time, while our peers helped us pick the best ones  in the most outstanding order.  It was a wonderful lesson, with great results.  These students know how important it is to use vivid, descriptive language to make their writing more exciting!  Check out a few samples from various grades.

Hewitt, 1st grade:
The big circular yellow sun shines warmly in the blue sky in the afternoon.

Maxine, 2nd grade:
The bright yellow sun shines happily on the playground at noon when I'm taking a nap.

Claire, 4th grade:
 Because it is twilight, the blinding yellow sun shines brightly on a field of wild flowers.

Joshua, 5th grade:
Because it is summer, the jubilant yellow sun shines brightly over the rainbow.

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