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Descriptive Essay

This document provides a comprehensive guide on how to write a descriptive essay, emphasizing the importance of appealing to the reader's senses. It outlines the purposes, requirements, and stages of writing, including planning, drafting, revising, and editing. Additionally, it offers tips for effective description and the use of sensory details to evoke emotions and create vivid imagery.

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19 views22 pages

Descriptive Essay

This document provides a comprehensive guide on how to write a descriptive essay, emphasizing the importance of appealing to the reader's senses. It outlines the purposes, requirements, and stages of writing, including planning, drafting, revising, and editing. Additionally, it offers tips for effective description and the use of sensory details to evoke emotions and create vivid imagery.

Uploaded by

phuongnguyendesign234.g3
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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WEEK

DESCRIPTIVE ESSAY
HOW TO WRITE A DESCRIPTIVE ESSAY

• A descriptive essay simply describes something


or someone by appealing to the reader’s
senses: sight, sound, touch, smell and taste.

 Essay employs the power of language and all the


human senses to bring a subject to life for the
reader.
Purposes of descriptive essay

 To create a vivid picture of a person, place, or thing


Requirements:
• must be precise in its detail

• go from the general to the specific

• make for interesting reading


• needs to consider audience preferences
Stages in writing descriptive essay
Planning your descriptive essay:

1. What or who do you want to describe?


• Concentrate on one or a selection of the following:
– Emotions:
• Think about how emotions make you feel
• Try to put that down in words.
– For instance, happiness makes you smile, sadness can feel like
a weight is pressing down on you and jealousy could be like a
monster snapping away inside.
Memories:
• Perhaps a childhood memory – such as a favorite toy or a day out. Maybe the toy
could bring comfort through its familiarity, and a day out could have either good or
bad memories.

Places
• Anywhere that evokes sight, sound and smell – beaches, cities or a fairground
– For example. All of these would be wonderful to write about in a descriptive essay.

People
• Perhaps someone you know, such as your father or a friend, or a stranger that you
see on the street.
– Here you could talk about the curve of someone’s face, describe their clothing or their
countenance.

An inanimate object
• This might seem a little tricky at first, but it is possible to describe an object.
– For instance, a table that is made from wood could have rich hues, be warm to the touch
or have gnarly knots in the surface.
2. What is your reason for writing your description?

3. What are the particular qualities that you want to focus on?
(see page 19)
Introduction of a descriptive essay
• Start with a good thesis statement.
– Create a thesis statement that informs the reader who or what you are
describing.
• Make sure that you are trying to assert a notion based on how you perceive
the subject to be described.

– try to provide first the very obvious characteristics of the subject.


• This way, you can easily capture the minds of the readers because they will
agree to your perceived subject qualities, making it easier to connect with
them.
– Narrow down your descriptions to more specific and striking
characteristics of the subject interest.
– Provide very specific qualities of the object that cannot be seen in other
similar things.
Body of a descriptive essay
Conclusion of a descriptive essay
Revise your writing
• Review, modify, and reorganize their work with the
goal of making it the best it can be
• Reread their work with these considerations in mind

– Have you provided enough details and descriptions to


enable your readers to gain a complete and vivid
perception?
– Have you left out any minor but important details?
– Have you used words that convey your emotion or
perspective?
– Are there any unnecessary details in your description?
– Does each paragraph of your essay focus on one aspect of
your description?

– Are your paragraphs ordered in the most effective way?

– Does the essay unfold in a way that helps the reader fully
appreciate the subject?

– Do any paragraphs confuse more than describe?

– Does the word choice and figurative language involve the


five senses and convey emotion and meaning?

– Has a connection been made between the description and


its meaning to the writer?

– Will the reader be able to identify with the conclusion made?


Edit your writing
• Correct errors in grammar and mechanics
• Improve style and clarity.
• Watch out for clichés
• Load up on adjectives and adverbs.

– Have a friend read the essay helps writers see


trouble spots and edit with a fresh perspective.
Tips for writing descriptive essay
• Follow the outline
• descriptive essay is show, don’t tell (giving
readers a visual idea of the subject)
• One of the best ways to show is to involve all
of the senses—not just sight, but also
hearing, touch, smell, and taste.
Focus on the subject.
– If you are describing a thing, person, place or event, you should be able
to concentrate only on the exact parameters of the subject.
– Do not overwhelm you readers with information like relating something to
other things.
– Pick something to describe in a very specific manner.

Make sure that you engage your readers to read more. do this by:
– Identify very strong points of the object that you are describing.

– Give very specific details.


Don’t forget the senses
• This is one of the strongest tools
– How does something look, smell, feel, taste or hear.

Evoke emotion
• Draw on your real life experience to describe how you
felt in situations.
– Use these feelings to create the same sense of reality to
your readers.
– Well written emotional scenes are one of the most powerful
use of words in a descriptive essay.
Use descriptive words

• Do not use vague words or generalities (such


as good, nice, bad, or beautiful).
• Be specific and use sensory, descriptive words
(adjectives).
• Provide sensory details:

– Smells that are in the air (the aroma of freshly brewed


coffee)

– Sounds (traffic, honking horns)

– Sights (“The sun scattered tiny diamonds across dew-


covered grass as it peeked out from beyond the horizon.”)
– Touch (“The texture of the adobe hut’s walls resembled
coarse sandpaper.”)
– Taste: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, tart (“Giant goose bumps
formed on my tongue when I accidentally bit into a sliver of
lemon.”)
Choose your words with care.
• Try to pick words which are well-known but perhaps
not quite so common.
– For example, use gargantuan instead of huge,
or desolate instead of upset.

Brainstorm!
• If you’re struggling to describe something, spend a few
minutes brainstorming for words that you’d use when
trying to explain it to others.
– For example, a drinking glass could be cold, transparent,
opaque, heavy, weighty, elegant, cheap, classy, etc.
Create a good pattern of organized discussion.
• The introductory parameter of the descriptive essay should be worked out
from general ideas to specific ones.

Draw a logical conclusion


• The conclusion may also use descriptive words; however, make certain
the conclusion is logical and relevant

Don’t overdo it.


• One regular error which is seen in descriptive writing is to use too many
descriptive words.
• You don’t need a long list to describe something when very often one word
will do the job.
– For instance, it’s not necessary to write ‘jolly, round and red’ when describing a
person’s face. Here the single word ‘jovial’ would suffice.

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