Writer's Craft
A writer's main job is to communicate clearly. One of the keys to doing this is...
To understand a text thoroughly, it's important to engage with it through a close reading. What's the act of documenting your thinking as you read?
What is annotating?
This literary legend is credited as being the master of iambic pentameter.
Who is Shakespeare?
The opposite of literal language.
What is figurative language?
A big idea or universal message that readers walk away with after reading or viewing a text.
What is a theme?
In poetry writing, this is the part in the poem where the meaning of the poem shifts in a new direction, it's usually where the reader can start to see a bigger theme of the piece.
What is a turn or volta?
When we read informational text, a key strategy for understanding is to be able to restate in a nutshell what's being said in our own words.
What is summarizing or paraphrasing?
This celebrity was credited for writing the shortest poem ever, Me We.
Who is Muhammad Ali?
Examples of figurative language.
What is metaphor, simile, hyperbole, sensory images?
In poetry, lines that come in sets of three and often have the same form.
What is a tercet?
In informational writing, paragraphs are often structured in this way. (Hint: There is a 4-letter mnemonic that we used this year for this structure. It starts with P.)
What is PEEL (point, evidence, explanation, link)?
When we read editorials, we want to pay attention to the art of the argument. This comes from ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle, who taught us about the 3 appeals of persuasion in speaking and writing. They are...
What is ethos, logos, and pathos?
This poet was known as an imagist and wrote a couplet about a Paris subway: "The apparition of the faces in the crowd: petals on a wet, black bough."
Who is Ezra Pound?
To give credit to others' work.
What is attribution or cite?
A reference to a famous person, text, event, or idea within a text.
What is allusion?
In editorial writing, this is another word for the author's argument.
What is a thesis or claim?
In reading poetry, it's important to simply notice these 4 layers.
What is sonic, sensory, visual, and ideational?
This person broke the traditional barriers of lyricism and was the first and only singer-songwriter to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Who is Bob Dylan?
The context of the story where the reader finds out the time, place, etc.
What is exposition?
The use of exaggeration for added emphasis or effect.
What is hyperbole?
There are many types of scripts for podcasts (or stories in general). Name one of them.
What is narrative, circular, or broken scripting?
Experts have shown that those who read at least 20 minutes a day for pleasure consistently excel in school and outperform others on standardized tests. For what other reason should we read every day?
What is to gain knowledge, insight, answer questions about the world, to be able to focus on one thing at a time, to quench curiosity, to entertain ourselves, to get through quarantine, to have interesting conversations with our bfs, gfs, and bffs...the list is endless!
This is a condensed form of literature, the "art of language itself" or "literature with all of the water wrung out."
What is poetry?
The French word for imitating or emulating another's work.
What is pastiche?
Placing opposing ideas side-by-side for the reader or viewer to consider.
CHALLENGE:
Placing objects or symbols out of place/time. We saw this in the "Stressed Out" music video by Twenty One Pilots.
What is juxtaposition or oxymoron?
What is anachronism?