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"Snapshot" Exercises & Sensory Detail Word Bank
Read a sample of creative descriptive writing to your science class. Discuss how writing can be used to record and communicate observations that scientists make. Reading selections and thought-provoking questions are suggested. Also...
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Let's Go Exploring!
Use a Courbet painting of a cave or tunnel opening to reinforce the importance of descriptive writing. Writers of all ages use sensory details to describe what the scene depicts as they pretend to be in the painting. Then they imagine...
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Sensory Visualization chart
In this sensory visualization worksheet, students are provided with spaces to record their senses after a teacher has given them a visual prompt.
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Lesson Plan 12: Writing With All Your Senses
What does an ice cream sundae sound like? Challenge young writers to move beyond visual descriptions and craft details that appeal to all five senses. The examples provided by the script in this resource show pupils how to create rich...
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Crafting Poetry: A Sensory Journey
Tenth graders experiment with poetry devices to write poems. In this poetry lesson, 10th graders participate in learning stations. Students create a word pool and select a word from the list to create a line of poetry. Students complete...
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Improving Descriptive Writing: Painting an Original Picture
Descriptive writing is rich in sensory appeals and paints pictures in the minds of readers. Show young writers how to use an on-line thesaurus and a cliché website to create fresh, descriptive writing. The presentation ends with an...
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Using Descriptive Language
Students examine the use of adjectives in a product review, then write their own descriptive review. In this writing and word usage lesson, students first analyze the choice of adjectives in a New York Times article about the iPhone,...
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Poetry: What's on Your Plate?
Students create original poetry on the subject of food. For this poetry writing lesson, students use sensory details about a food item to create a class poem. Students then write short poems with one sensory detail and add another...
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Reliving History through Slave Narratives
Helpful for an American literature or history unit, this lesson prompts middle schoolers to examine slavery in the United States. They read slave narratives that were part of the Federal Writers' Project and then conduct their own...
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Imagery: Show, Don't Tell
A vampire, the beach, a bedroom, the school cafeteria. Writers are encouraged to add sensory details (sight, touch, taste, smell, sound) to bring these things to life.
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Locational Writing
Students go outside to the playground and write a piece in the style of beat poets based on what they see and hear outside.
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Writing Descriptions of "My Favorite Place"
Students write a descriptive writing piece. In this writing activity, students use a visualization exercise to add more descriptions to their writing.