Style Smiles Adding style to student writing.

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Style SmilesAdding style to student writing.

• Presented by
• Sharon Bonney
• McCleskey Middle School

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The Components of Style
Style The degree to which the writer controls
language to engage the reader.
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Magic 3

• Three examples in a series can create a poetic
  rhythm or add support (elaboration)
• At low tide I played croquet with the Queen of
  Hearts, flew to the moon in a hammock, and fed my
  dolls deviled ham sandwiches in the shade of the
  screened house.

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• Biting my nails takes a lot less less time,
  energy, and money.
• We would just think, and my small hands would
  move in my grandmothers hair, twirling, curling,
  rolling that soft grayness around.

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Figurative Language

• Similes, metaphors, and personification add spice
  to writing and can help paint a more vivid
  picture
• Every time hes called a new name it slices like
  a paper cut.
• My younger sister squealed whenever a sheep
  licked her salty fingers.

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Elaboration

• It is like the color yellow, bright and happy
  making you feel joyful.
• My name is a battlefield where I am conquering
  the enemy.
• It is a sunflower growing in the desert, tall and
  strong giving life to the wasteland.

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Specific Details for Effect(Imagery)

• Sensory details provide elaboration and help the
  reader visualize the person, place, thing, or
  idea
• I lift the blue and white cloth covering the
  bread and slice a piece. I slather on butter and
  homemade strawberry jam. The butter melts
  instantly. The bread is just hours old. I perch
  at the window and peer out to find the creator of
  this mouth-watering bread Grandpa.

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Repetition for Effect Parallel Structure

• Writers often repeat specifically chosen words or
  phrases to make a point or stress certain ideas
  for the reader
• Every day some kid makes a big name for himself
  in high school or college, but only the best make
  it to the NFL. Only the best make it to the Hall
  of Fame. And in this dog-eat-dog league, only
  the best survive.

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Expanded Moment

• Instead of just mentioning a moment, extend it
  with the use of sensory details.
• I dont belong in some dumb math class. I
  belong at the beach, where I can soak my feet in
  caressing water and let the wind wander its way
  through my chestnut hair and sip Doctor Pepper
  all day long.

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Practice Prompt

• Almost every culture has myths and stories
  surrounding hair as a symbol of power, beauty, or
  strength. Everyone has a hair story and it is
  usually funny or touching.

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Humor

• Laughter can make a boring paper into one that is
  actually fun to read and grade!
• He laughed? Im nothing. Im the rear end of
  nothing, and the devil smiled at me.

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Hyphenated Modifier

• Hyphenated adjectives make the reader see things
  in a new way.
• Shes got this blond hair and big green eyes and
  this Im-so-beautiful-and-I-know-it body.

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Full Circle Ending

• Sometimes a trick for a special ending will
  really wrap up the work. One way is to repeat a
  phrase from the beginning of the piece.
• Beginning Hey, you, with the green and orange
  striped shoelaces.
• Ending Now, he sits behind me with his green
  and orange striped shoelaces

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Practice Prompt

• Humor
• Hyphenated Modifier
• Full Circle Ending
• Write about a pre-school or kindergarten memory.

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References

• Ledbetter, Mary (1996). Strengthening Your
  Students' Writing and Reading. Bellevue, WA
  Bureau of Education and Research.
• Noden, Harry R. (1999). Image Grammar.
  Portsmouth, NH Heinemann
• Reif, Linda (2003). 100 Quickwrites. New York
  Scholastic Inc..