Descriptive Language

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Descriptive Language

• Presented by Heidi Dinardi

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Why is Descriptive Language important??

• It responds to our senses taste, touch, smell,
  sight, and sound.
• It helps make paragraphs come to life for the
  reader.

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An example

• The house sat in the middle of town. It belonged
  to the old man. He went to work everyday and
  returned home at 600pm. His wife made him
  dinner. He then read the paper and went to bed.

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Revised with descriptive language

• The red trimmed three-story house sat in the
  middle of the tiny town. The old man who had
  gray hair, with little curls at the end, owned
  it. He used a self made intricate designed cane
  to walk to work at the rustic old hardware store
  with squeaky boards that sounded like a rocking
  chair when stepped upon. When the old man
  returned home at dusk, his wife made the normal
  juicy steak, lumpy mashed potatoes, garden green
  beans with cheese, and sweet warm apple pie. He
  read about the town gossip from Eleanor Dribble
  in the Morgan County paper, and then resided to
  his cotton flannel sheets, with downy-feathered
  pillows.

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To make paragraphs come to life, you can use the
following

• Adjectives
• Figurative Language
• Simile
• Metaphor

• Adverbs
• Personification
• Imagery

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Adjectives--anything you can sense about a noun
is described with an adjective. They give
specific details about nouns.

• Sight colors, shapes, sizes Example The green
  grass.
• Sound types and volume Example The rattling
  wind.
• Smell scents and strengths Example The potato
  is putrid.
• Taste flavors and strengths Example The spicy
  hot dog.
• Touch textures and temperatures Example The
  rough wall.

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Adverbs--give more information and tell us the
quality of how something is done or how it
occurs.

• Example The girl ran to the store.
• How? Slowly, Quickly
• When? Yesterday, Today
• Example She was tired.
• Here we are asking how much about the adjective.
• Very, Not, Too

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Similes--comparisons of two unlike things using
the word like or as. Used to intensify emotional
responses and create vivid images.

• Example The hood of my car is hot.
• The surface of my car is hot like an iron.
• Example That emerald is green.
• The color of that emerald is like grass.
• His hands were like wild birds. John Updike
  Ex-basketball player

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Metaphor--a figure of speech comparing two unlike
things that have something in common. Do Not use
like or as!!

• Example That car is a dream. (perfect,
  beautiful)
• Example Time marches on. (steadily,
  constantly, deliberately)
• Example I want to get off this merry-go-round
  of stress. (never-ending, confusing, giddy)
• Example Written by Carl Sandbury
• The sky of gray is eaten in six places, rag
  holes stand out. It is an army blanket and the
  sleeper slept to near the fire.

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Figurative Language--expanded beyond its ordinary
literal meaning. It uses comparisons to achieve
new affects, to provide fresh insights, or to
express a relationship between things essentially
unlike.

• The moon like to a silver bow new-bent in heaven
• William Shakespeare
• Like a lobster boiled, the morn from black to red
  began to burn
• Samuel Butler

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Personification--a figure of speech in which
human characteristics are assigned to nonhuman
things.

• William Wordsworth
• The green field sleeps in the sun
• Like an army defeated, the snow hat retreated

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Imagery--words and phrases that appeal to the
readers senses of sight, sound, touch, smell,
taste, or internal feelings.

• Jesse Stuart, from Dark Winter
• The sun is up today, Water drips from the eves
  of the house. Icicles melt into water and
  drip-drip from nine in the morning till three in
  the evening. White clouds scud the sky. Winter
  has started breakin up. Warm thaw winds blow
  through the bare Kentucky trees. One can feel
  them, warm soft winds, winds that remind us of
  rain.

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When to teach the different techniques used in
descriptive language

• Adjectives and adverbs can be taught to beginning
  level writers.
• Teachers may be safe teaching similes and
  metaphors to middle level writers perhaps even
  some beginning writers.
• Figurative Language, personification, and imagery
  may all be elements that a teacher should wait
  and teach to advanced writers. This probably
  wont be learned until later in high school.

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The End
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References

• http//www.bhsu.edu/artssciences/writingcenter/faq
  fall1999/descsm.html
• http//www.mtsac,edu/jjenkins/desc.html
• http//www.eureka-usd.k12.ca.us/ojhs/
  Core8/Lewis/descriptivelanguage.htm