Writing Deadly Descriptive Paragraphs

Descriptive paragraphs are paragraphs that use words to paint a picture in the mind of the reader. Good descriptive writers use words that engage the five senses of the reader.

Good descriptive writers think of questions a reader might have about the thing being described and try to answer those questions. Examples of questions a good descriptive writer might ask are in the picture at the right. Try to answer some of these questions about the tree you just looked at before moving onto the next page.

Here is another tree ready to be described.

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Before you write your paragraph you want to think about who the audience is going to be. Are you writing the paragraph for your classmates? For your teachers? For someone who has never seen what you are describing? Each of these readers will need different information to see the description.

Listen

If you are having trouble answering these questions turn back to the page before and look at the picture again. Or look at the list of details you wrote down and use them to help you.

Listen

How is your tree different from the tree on the first page? What are important details to include in your description of each tree so your audience understands how the trees are different?

Listen

Select this then click anywhere in the book to start reading text Speak the current selection Stops speech playback Double-click a word in the book and click this icon to translate the word into Spanish