Paint with Action Verb Brush Strokes

Day 1

What are action verbs?

An action verb is a word that expresses action.

It may be made up of more than one word.

An action verb can be physical (shout, arrive) or mental (memorize, forget).

Day 1

Examples

The director shouts at the members of the cast.

The lights are flashing above the stage. The audience arrived in time for the

performance. Several singers have memorized the

lyrics of a song.

Day 2

Day 2

Day 2

Specific and General Nouns

What is a noun?

A noun is a word that names a person, a place, a thing, or an idea.

Examples

Persons: sister, mayor, coach, children, George Washington, Jessica Alba

Places: park, lake, playground, city, Houston, Alabama, America, France

Things: magazine, boots, rose, peach, Titanic, ship, Statue of Liberty

Ideas: honesty, truth, democracy, pride, maturity, progress, courage

How can you make this sentence more specific?

The person jumped along the street.

Sally jumped along Sunset Boulevard.

Paint with Adjectives Out-of-Order

What are adjectives?

An adjective is a word that describes, or modifies, a noun or a pronoun.

They answer one of three questions: What kind? We studied ancient history. How many? I read four chapters. Which one? That invention changed

history.

Paint with Appositive Brush Strokes

What is an appositive?

An appositive is a noun that is placed next to another noun to identify it or add information to it.

Appositives can appear anywhere in a sentence as long as they are right next to the noun they identify.

Examples

James Madison’s wife, Dolly, was a famous first lady.

The noun, Dolly, tells us James Madison’s wife’s name. Dolly is an appositive.

Notice how it is set off from the sentence by commas. This is how we punctuate appositives.

Examples, cont’d

Sometimes you can use more than one word to make an appositive.

Madison, our fourth president, held many other offices.

“Our fourth president” tells us more information about Madison and it is set off by commas. “Our fourth president” is an appositive.

Revising with Appositive Brush Strokes

If you have two sentences and one of them has a being verb you can combine them with an appositive in place of the being verb.

Paint with Participle Brush Strokes

What is a participle?

There are two kinds of participles present and past. Present participles are verbs that end in –

ing. Past participles are verbs that end in –d or

–ed. In order to use a participle as a brush

stroke the participle cannot be the main verb in the sentence.

Examples

Sitting quietly, Erik loses himself in the music.

Playing the piano, Eric taps his foot along to the beat.

Dreaming of fame, Eric sits at the piano. Lingering at the door, Brent waited for

his friend.

One word Participles

Instead of using a phrase (Jumping in place) you can use a combination of one word participles at the beginning or end of a sentence to create drama.

Jumping in place, Mike skipped rope. Leaping, sweating, smiling, Mike skipped

rope.

Warning!

Make sure that your participle brush stroke comes right before or right after the noun that you are describing.

Singing, splashing, and laughing the swimmer attracted the shark.

The swimmer is the one singing, splashing and laughing so it is the noun closest to the participle brush stroke.

Warning! Cont’d

Singing, splashing, and laughing, the shark was attracted to the swimmer.

Is the shark singing, splashing, and laughing?

MAKE SURE THAT YOU PUT THE CORRECT NOUN NEXT TO YOUR PARTICIPLE BRUSH STROKE!

Paint with Absolute Brush Strokes

What is an absolute?

An absolute is a noun followed by a verb that ends in –ing.

Examples

Mind racingAnxiety overtakingJaws crackingTongue curling

Examples Cont’d

Don’t think that you have to stick to two words if you have something more involved in mind

Digits glowing florescent blue in the inky darkness of my room, my clock edged its way toward midnight.

Notice that it still begins with a noun and an –ing word

Helpful Hint!It is always a good idea to create your simple sentence before adding your absolutes! If you do this, then you know

that you have used your brush stroke correctly!

Revising to add Absolute Brush Strokes

Remember that when revising you can combine a few short sentences using absolutes.

Helpful Hints when using Brush Strokes Never use more than 3 brush strokes per

sentence. Try not to put more than 2 brush strokes right

next to each other. You don’t have to use brush strokes in every

sentence. Varying the types, location, and frequency of

the brush strokes will make your writing more interesting.