Writing with Stardust: The Ultimate Descriptive Guide for students, parents, teachers and writers (26 page)

                        PLANNING A LEVEL 5

Planning a Level 5 essay may take a different type of approach. In the ‘Waterfall’ chapter, for example, I wanted to use the zoom narration technique that I talked about on page 4. To do this, a waterfall has to be broken down into its three main features: sound, motion and appearance.

SOUND:
The aim was to recapture both the loud, stentorian sounds and soft, musical effect of a waterfall. To do this I would need a mixture of
cacophony
and
euphony
.

MOTION:
The objective was to recreate the smooth, eel-like quality of a waterfall as it slid over the rock. A mixture of euphonious
similes
and
metaphors
were required for that.

APPEARANCE:
If possible, I also wanted to capture the mirage-like and hallucinatory effect of the spray as it glimmered in the light. The use of selective
diction
and lucid
imagery
were the main focus here.

Then it was just a case of deconstructing the passage down to its most basic component-words.

Introduction- The distance of sound:
humming, buzzing, tingle.

Paragraph 1- Sounds increasing in volume:
growling, rumbling, foamed, cacophonous, thunderclap.

Paragraph 1- Sounds of the infinity pool:
rushed, roiling, bubbling, boiling, churning.

Paragraph 2- Creative sounds for water:
swoosh-plunk, hiss-plop, salvo, slushiness,

slobbering.

Paragraph 2- ‘S’ verbs to recreate the flow:
streamed, smooth, spilled, slid.

Paragraph 2- The sound of bells:
chiming, chinking, tinkling, pinged, plinked.

Paragraph 3- The sunlight on the spray:
a-glitter, sparkling, flickering, shimmering, dazzling.

Paragraph 3- Five words for surreal:
trance-like, dreamy, illusory, mirage, mystique.

Conclusion-
humming repeated.

Negative words not included:
slithered, serpentine, snaked, salacious, sneaky.

Whether a student tries to use the grids or word clusters like this, both methods are highly successful in imparting a love of English. He or she will also get to love the texture of the language as they are working from a pattern that they can relate to.  It is always better for an educator to show
how to do it
rather than tell a student what to do. By working from the basics upwards, a student can empower himself/herself to enjoy English and to thrive at it.

            THUNDER AND LIGHTNING

                                                     
COLOUR

LEVEL 1         LEVEL 2         LEVEL 3         LEVEL 4         LEVEL 5          OTHERS

1. Lightning
flashed
and slashed through the mamba-black sky.

2. Lightning
flickered
and cackled in the coven-black sky.

3. Lightning
flared
. It seethed and streaked across the witch soul-black sky.

4. Lightning
flamed
in the sky. It whirred and whipped across the abyss-black clouds.

5. Lightning
enflamed
the heathen-black sky. It whimpered and wriggled like a wizard’s whip before dying into nothingness.

                                                        
SOUND

1. The booming and blasting thunder burst
the cocoon of silence
.

2. The clapping and bellowing thunder ripped
the fragile veil of silence
.

3. The groaning and growling thunder fractured
the sacristy-still peace
.

4
.
The mausoleum-quiet silence
was rent by the pealing and yowling thunder.

5.
The ecclesiastical silence
was blasted apart by the sonorous and stentorian thunder.

                                                           
SHAPE

1. The boiling sky was
gun barrel-black
.

2. The riotous sky was
gunpowder-black
.

3. The crumpling, buckling sky was
thundercloud-black
.

4. The moiling and roiling skies were
midnight-black
and looming over us.

5. The turbulent skies were a ruinous,
vulcanite-black
and spoke of impending doom.

                                                      
ACTION

1. An explosion of thunder tore split
the vault-like silence
.

2. Thunder echoed in the sky and shattered
the shrine-still silence
.

3. The mournful thunder tore
the womb-like silence
apart.

4. Thunder resonated in the sky and splintered
the tomb-like silence
.
Then it faded into tintinnabulation.

5.
The cenotaph-still silence
was ruptured by the sonic boom of thunder. The aftershock hummed in the air long after it had died.

                                              
LIGHTNING
COLOUR

1. The
brilliant
lightning was star flame-gold.

2. The
radiant
lightning was lustrous-gold.

3. The
resplendent
lightning was glitter-gold.

4. The
scintillating
lightning flashed like foil-gold.

5. The
incandescent
lightning was a-blaze in its God-goldened glory.

                                                          
SOUND

1. The
alien
lightning buzzed and crackled.

2. The
unearthly
lightning hissed and sissed.

3. The
otherworldly
lightning fizzed and fizzled across the sky.

4. The
arcane
lightning seared itself into flame and scorched across the sky.

5. The
eldritch
lightning sizzled itself into fire and whizzed across the sky.

                                                          
SHAPE

1. The branched lightning was
shaped like twisted veins
.

2. The pronged lightning was
shaped like creeping capillaries
.

3. The crooked lightning was
shaped like misshapen plasma streams
.

3. The antlered lightning was
shaped like spread-eagled rivers of solar flame
.

5. The bifurcated lightning was
shaped like a witch’s, warped whip
.

                                                        
ACTION

1. The blazing lightning was
as crackly as frizzy, electrified hair
.

2. The quivering lightning was shaped
like a cat-o’-nine tails
.

3. The whining lightning was
as
bright as the crawling cracks on stained glass
.

4. The squealing lightning was
as
vitrified as the creeping cracks on a frozen pond
.

5. The zigzagging lightning was
like the ruinous cracks on crumbling mortar
.

                                                       
COLD SEAS