Now that my
students have some familiarity with how to describe a setting in a narrative,
it’s time for them to look at some great examples from literature. I cannot
emphasize the importance of exposing kids to strong writing if you want them to
grow as writers. For the next two workshops we examine paragraphs of setting
descriptions. We discuss what words paint pictures and take the reader right
into that setting. The kids then list the sensory details in columns. In the
final part of the lesson they draw and color what is being described.
Here are
some sample paragraphs I’ve used for these workshops.
The moon was
high overhead when the little band came out on the grassy marshland. They
stopped a moment to listen to the wide blades of grass whisper and squeak in
the wind, to sniff the tickling smell of salty grass. This was the exciting
smell that urged them on. With wild snorts of happiness they buried their noses
in the long grass. They bit and tore great mouthfuls. Oh, the salty goodness of
it! Not bitter at all, but juicy-sweet with rain. It was different from any
grass they knew. It billowed and shimmered like the sea.
From Misty of Chincoteague by Margeurite
Henry
It was a large lovely garden, with soft
green grass. Here and there over the grass stood beautiful flowers like stars,
and there were twelve peach-trees that in the spring-time broke out into
delicate blossoms of pink and pearl, and in the autumn bore rich fruit. The
birds sat on the trees and sang so sweetly that the children used to stop their
games in order to listen to them. “How happy we are here!” they cried to each
other.
Oscar Wilde – from The
Selfish Giant
A fish jumped.
Not a large fish, but it made a big splash near the beaver, and as if by a
signal there were suddenly little splops all over the side of the lake – along
the shore – as fish began jumping. Hundreds of them, jumping and slapping the
water. Brian watched them for a time, still in the half-daze, still not
thinking well. The scenery was very pretty, he thought, and there were new
things to look at, but it was all a green and blue blur and he was used to the
gray and black of the city, the sounds of the city. Traffic, people, talking,
sounds all the time – the hum and whine of the city.
From Hatchet by Gary Paulsen
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