Methods+Of+Elaboration

Methods of Elaboration © Mary Ellen Ledbetter Ready-to-Use English Workshop Activities

1. __**Action Verbs**__ – words that depict action in the physical world. Pottery, that’s all it was / Pastelled with green, pink; / blotted with sunset and clear October mornings / I had never seen such beauty / A young woman / hair nested in a bun / clutching tight to her daughter (Lindsey Daugherty) giggled, buzzed, watching, bubbles, circles, yawn, flailed, writhes, peeks, wag

2. __Adjectives/Adverbs__ – describing words. You were bone skinny, legs the size of a supermodel’s arms, had dark tree-bark skin, two shades darker than mine. Your long, black hair was … Your pants were a pair of hundred-year-old-need-to-be-thrown-out-or-burned jeans. Your skinny feet were devoured by oversized working boots. (Sarah Mitchell) Walking through the wheat fields that looked solemnly down on me, I would lose myself in the beauty of the day. The thin wheat stalks swaying beneath the sky whispered gloriously in unison. (Amy Kirch)

3. **__Allusions__** – brief of slight mention of someone or something to emphasize your point. In Jewel’s Song “Stand,” she uses allusion several times to refer to people in history. Marvin Gaye, there's no brother, brother Woody Guthrie's land can't feed Mother While in the corner, King's dream dies

4. __**Analogies**__ – A comparison between two things used to make a point or idea memorable: comparing lips to a rose or school to prison. They are often used in extended form in arguments. An argument based on analogy, for example, is as follows: advertising cigarettes is like manslaughter. Arguments by analogy are easily refuted since analogies can only hold so far.

5. __**Anecdotes**__ - A short narrative account of an amusing, unusual, revealing, or interesting event. I remember those days when I would just sit down on the bed and watch Daddy let black socls engulf his feet, squeeze his size-twelve feet into size-ten shoes, and I would be elated when he asked me to button his sleeves. When we walked out the door, he would always remind me, “Remember, we’re not poor, so don’t let anyone say that to you. We just have financial problems.” (Jerrod Morgan)

6. __**Definitions**__ – provide a definition of a term for explanation, for further description, to show the essential nature, to define boundaries, or to entertain. The doctor gasped as he pulled some scary-looking object -- almost a perfect oval –and placed it on the table. He studied the “thing” as if he were a carrion-eating bird, a vulture swooping down on a freshly killed waterbuck, an antelope with a reddish-brown coat. The only apparent difference was that his coat was white. (Victoria Siegelman) According to Webster's Dictionary, a government is the authority that serves the people and acts on their behalf. How can the government know what the people want if the people do not vote? If we do not vote, the government may act on its own behalf instead of on the behalf of the people.

7. __**Descriptions**__ – provide MORE information about your topic (usually with adjectives and/or adverbs) He was an 83-year old, my-way-or-the-highway, beer-drinking, cigar-smoking, cowboy-hat-wearing man that just so happened to be my grandfather. (Jose Campos)

8. __**Dialogue**__ – using quotations. It can be dialogue between people, internal dialogue, or even an example or what someone might say. We have all had “fake” friendships, people who have talked about us or done something behind our backs or simply made fun of us. Lots of people gossip about others just to make themselves look good or to be the center of attention, but people don’t like liars. These “fake” friends might lie and say something like “Did you ear that Bob likes Barbara so Barbara broke up with nick because she said she never really liked him in the first place?” Or “I hear she’s