SPIVEY DESCRIBERS

Describers/Adjectives

For many years, you have been practicing adding adjectives to your writing. Why do

writers do this?

COMMAS IN MORE THAN ONE

DESCRIBER/ADJECTIVE

RULE: WHEN YOU ARE USING MORE THAN ONE ADJECTIVE

BEFORE NOUN, YOU MUST USE COMMAS. THE IMPORTANT THING TO REMEMBER IS THAT THERE IS

NOT A COMMA BETWEEN THE LAST ADJECTIVE AND THE NOUN.

EXAMPLES OF COMMAS IN A SET OF

DESCRIBERS/ADJECTIVES

The petite, elderly woman sat on the bench with her best friend.

While laying in bed, I read an exciting, adventurous novel about pirates and their lost treasure.

ADDING ADJECTIVES/DESRIBERS

to our writing

MST: The snowflake fell.

For this MST, you should be adding adjectives and noun expanders. No more: The nice snowflake fell. We need to really expand our sentences!

LET’S TRY ONE MORE!

MST: THE CHILD SAT.

REMEMBER: -USE“MORE THAN ONE SYLLABLE” WORDS -ADD NOUN EXPANDERS -ADD DESCRIBERS

“WITH/WITHOUT/THAT” GROUPS

ANOTHER WAY TO EXPAND THE MEANING OF THE WHO or WHAT

OR ANY NOUN IS TO WRITE A GROUP OF WORDS AFTER THE WHO OR WHAT. ONE OF THESE

GROUPS BEGIN WITH THE WORDS“WITH” OR “WITHOUT”

EXAMPLES

The cat-NOUN without the collar-NOUN EXPANDER

went into the house next door.-ACTION

The machine-NOUNwhich was just repaired-NOUN

EXPANDERbroke down again.-ACTION

The mouse -NOUNwithout the cheese-NOUN EXPANDERmoved slowly into the hole.-ACTION

YOUR TURN

WHAT + EXPANDER (WITH) + ACTION

WHO+ EXPANDER (THAT) + ACTION + WHERE

WHEN + WHO + EXPANDER (WITHOUT) + ACTION + ACTION + WHERE