LEADS

1
LEADS

• Find a way to hook your reader!
• A good lead must hook the readers attention and
  arouse their curiosity by being entertaining
  and/or interesting so the reader will continue
  reading. It should drop the reader into the
  middle of the action.

2
Techniques to Begin

• A little sip of the conclusion to get the
  readers attention and pique his or her interest
• A funny story or personal anecdote to set a
  humorous of individual tone
• A list of main points to introduce the topic in a
  serious, logical, or straightforward manner
• A dramatic, sweeping, or eye-opening statement
• An expert quotation to establish credibility from
  the start.
• The students own angleone that readers have
  never seen before

3
How Do You Hook The Reader

• Dialogue
• Setting
• Action
• Emotion
• Detail
• Quotation
• Describe a character

4
Dialogue

• Using your rules for dialogue, begin with one of
  you main characters speaking either out loud or
  saying something in their head.
• Example Pass me the ball! I hollered to my
  friend as he paced the floor looking for an
  opening.
• Be sure to extend the thought!!

5
Description of What You See and What You Feel!

• Describe the setting of where the story takes
  place
• Example The stadium was packed with excited fans
  all looking for our team to win. Blurs of blue
  and gold colored my vision as my eyes scanned the
  bleachers. I could feel my energy rising as I
  felt the crowds enthusiasm cheer me on. This was
  it. This was our time to shine.

6
Action

• Example
• The whistle sounded and rang through the stadium
  like an oversized church bell. Immediately the
  crowd jumped to their feet and began shrieking
  like children on a roller coaster gone wild.
  Their energy surged through my veins. I could
  feel my adrenaline rise as I jumped up and down
  on my toes trying to stay warm.

7
Emotion

• Example She could no longer endure the pain.
  Her tears subsided, but the sobs continued to
  wrack her body

8
Detail

• Old man Higgins stopped his beat up Chevy on the
  side of the dirt road to watch the bright,
  disc-shaped light zig-zag across the night sky.
  Jon Gwodz

9
Quotation

• Live and let live, my old man used to say. He
  should have followed his own advice.

10
Describe a Character

• Of the many explorers who have sought traces of
  Atlantis, none was more intrepid than Colonel
  Percy Harris Fawcett. A self-proclaimed lone
  wolf, he solved to accomplish what no man before
  him had. Chris Huff
• Gramps says that I am a country girl at heart,
  and that is true. I have lived most of my
  thirteen years in Bybanks, Kentucky, which is not
  much more than a caboodle of houses rooting in a
  green spot alongside the Ohio River. Walk Two
  Moons by Sharon Creech

11
Avoid leads that begin with

• What do you do with a million dollars?
• When I was six
• Ill never forget the time
• One day
• I am going to tell you about

12
Organization

• Information can be organized in many ways
• Organize by Space
• Organize by Time
• Organize by Content
• Organize by Perspective

13
Organize by Time

• If you are writing stories/narratives, or
  explaining events
• Keep your stories small begin with what
  matters, and when the story ends, stop.

14
Practice I Will Divide