ABSTRACT TO CONCRETE LANGUAGE

1. ABSTRACT TO CONCRETE LANGUAGE Improving writing through the use of imagery and figurative language to develop theme and tone

2. Learning Targets • I understand how writers use figurative language and imagery to relay an underlying theme or tone. • I can use concrete details to represent an abstract idea. • I can choose important details and appropriate metaphors to enhance the development of tone and theme in my own writing.

3. What are abstractions?Example: Sadness What are concrete details? Examples: metaphors like heavy waves or sensations like hot tears etc.

4. Why is this important? You could be ‘sad’ that the lunchroom is out of General Tso’s. I could be ‘sad’ because I just found out that a family member has cancer.

5. What is the metaphor? What is the abstract idea it represents? To what effect? • “Come from the South, blow with the wind- poom!- North will follow. Strongest wind cannot be seen.” • “As I began to play, the boy disappeared, the color ran out of the room, and I saw only my white pieces and his black one’s waiting on the other side. A light wind began blowing past my ears. A wind whispered secrets only I could hear. ‘Blow from the South’ it murmured, ‘The wind leaves no trace.’” • “My mother’s eyes turned to dangerous black slits. She had no words for me, just sharp silence. I felt the hot wind rush around my ears.”

6. What is the metaphor? What is the abstract idea it represents? To what effect? • “I learned about the middle game [in chess] and why tactics between two adversaries are like clashing ideas.” • “Her black men advanced across the plane, slowly marching to each successive level as a single unit. My white pieces screamed as they scurried and fell off the board one by one. As her men drew closer to my edge, I felt myself growing light.”

7. How are the two metaphors intertwined at the end? To what end? “Higher and higher, above the alley over the tiled roofs, where I was gathered up by the wind and pushed toward the night sky until everything below me disappeared and I was alone. I closed my eyes and pondered my next move.”

8. Make a list of abstractions Make sure you have many good examples because they will help you later!