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Running head: DESCRIPTIVE WRITING

Writing Lesson Plan

Descriptive Paragraph

Bethany Anderson

Azusa Pacific University

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Context

These lessons will be taught as part of a Reading/Writing curriculum in a community

college credit ESL class. Students in this class range from high beginning to low intermediate

levels of English reading/writing proficiency. Most students in this program plan to enroll in

regular credit classes upon completion of ESL courses and need to demonstrate a sufficient level

of reading/writing proficiency (as determined by the college’s placement test) in order to move

on to College Reading and Writing, the next required course for any degree program.

The class is comprised of students from a variety of countries who live in the community

as well as international students who are participating in short-term exchange programs at the

college or are student athletes. Students’ ages range from 17-50, with approximately half the

class of “traditional” college age (17-21) and the other half older adults who have enrolled in

college to improve their English and/or make a career change. Classes meet two days per week

for 50 minutes.

The class texts are Writing Power 1 (Blanchard, 2013) and More About the USA (Broukal

& Milhomme, 1996). The purpose of this course is to build English reading and writing skills

while preparing students for college-level reading and writing courses. Upon completion of this

course, students will have the necessary competencies in academic reading and writing to enroll

in College Reading and Writing.

Rationale

This course begins building the skills that will be necessary for writing assignments in the

required course College Reading and Writing, following a genre-based model (EAP) focused on

developing academic writing skills (Ferris & Hedgecock, 2014). This lesson fits within that
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framework by focusing on the type of descriptive writing that will be required in College

Reading and Writing and Composition I (e.g., the descriptive narrative essay). The prewriting

activities included in this lesson use picture prompts, brainstorming interviews (Foreign

Language Teaching Methods, 2010) and text analysis to prepare students to write a paragraph

describing a familiar place.

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Writing Lesson Plan

Title: Descriptive Paragraph

Time Frame: 50 minute lesson

Assumptions: Students have learned basic parts of speech (verb, pronoun, adjective) in previous

lessons.

Materials Needed

• More About the USA text

• Writing Power 1 text

• Beach or other distinctive place picture (See Appendix A)

Lesson Outcomes

Upon completion of this lesson, students will be able to:

• Identify descriptive adjectives in a reading passage

• Identify details to describe a place based on the five senses

• Brainstorm a list of adjectives to describe a place

• Write a descriptive paragraph about a familiar place

Warm-up (5 min)

• Show a picture of a distinctive place on the projector (Example: beach picture, Appendix

A)

• Ask Ss to describe the picture

• Write any descriptive adjectives they provide on board

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• Ask, “What are all these words?” (adjectives)

• Remind Ss that adjectives describe a noun (like a person, place, or thing)

• Ask Ss to think of additional adjectives that describe the photo; write on board

Adjective Practice (10 min)

• Go over the explanation of adjectives on p. 24 in Writing Power 1 (Appendix B).

• Have Ss complete Exercise 1 on their own.

• Go over the answers to Exercise 1, calling on Ss to provide the adjective in each

sentence.

Text Analysis (10 min)

• Have Ss choose a partner and read the first paragraph of “The Okefenokee” in More

About the USA (Appendix C). Working together, have pairs identify all adjectives used

to describe the swamp.

• Call on Ss and have them list one adjective from the text (mysterious, unknown,

terrifying, ancient, thick, moist, heavy, narrow, misty, etc.). Write adjectives on the

board.

• Ask, “what details help you to picture this place in your mind?”

Brainstorming Interview (10 min)

• Have Ss think of a place they like to go. It might be a city (like their hometown or

somewhere they have traveled) or a specific location, like a relative’s house or a favorite

coffee shop.
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• Have Ss partner with a classmate and ask each other Wh-questions about what they see,

hear, feel, smell, and taste in this place.

• After they have answered each other’s questions, have each S write a list of all the details

they described to their partner.

Descriptions using the 5 senses (10 min)

• Write, What do you. . . on the board and the words below as column headings:

See Hear Smell Taste Feel

• Explain that these are the five senses and thinking about these senses will help them

create a mental image so their readers can imagine the place they are describing. (To

illustrate this point, ask Ss which sentence helps them imagine the place better: There is a

beach or There is a peaceful beach where salty turquoise waves rhythmically meet the

warm, white sand?)

• Have Ss call out descriptive words they wrote in their list that go with each of the five

senses and write on the board under each heading.

• Instruct Ss to think of a few descriptive adjectives that give more information about some

of the details in their list (e.g. noisy waves, scratched table, quiet street, etc.).

Wrap-up (5 min)

• Have Ss copy the column headings from the board (see, hear, smell, taste, feel) into their

notebook.

• Have Ss to write all the descriptive words they want to include in their paragraph under

the appropriate category.

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• Ask, do you have at least one word for each category? If not, think of one or two

descriptive words for each sense before you start writing.

• Ask, do you have a descriptive adjective for at least some of your nouns? If not, think of a

few adjectives you could use to describe the place even more clearly before you start

writing. To think of more adjectives you can ask yourself, “What kind of a house? What

kind of a room?”

Assignment

• Write 6-8 sentences about the place you chose. Help your reader imagine what you see,

hear, feel, and smell in that place using descriptive adjectives.

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Appendix A

Example Beach Photo Prompt

Retrieved from [Link]

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Appendix B

Adjectives Explanation and Exercise (Blanchard, 2013, p. 24-25)

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Appendix C

Unit 10: The Okefenokee (Broukal & Milhomme, 1996, p. 59)

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References

Blanchard, K. (2013). Writing power. White Plains, NY: Pearson.

Broukal, M. and Milhomme, J. (1996). More about the USA: A cultural reader. White Plains,

NY: Pearson.

Catalonia Hotels & Resorts (2015). Retrieved from [Link]

the-best-beaches-of-punta-cana/

Ferris, D. & Hedgecock, J. (2014). Teaching L2 composition: Purpose, process and practice (3rd

ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.

Foreign Language Teaching Methods (2010). Carl Blyth, Editor. COERLL, The University of

Texas at Austin. Retrieved from [Link]