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6 Decorating Tool

‘WOW’ WORDS Emotive (Emotional) Words
Using ‘ambitious’ or ‘WOW’ words in your Emotive words are words that trigger
writing will impress your reader and will emotions such as anger, disgust, shock or
improve your grades! For example, instead sadness. When you are writing to
of using ‘good’, try: PERSUADE or to ARGUE, use emotive words
amazing, brilliant, enjoyable, fabulous, to make your reader see your side of view
fantastic, great, incredible, marvellous, or to make them feel strongly about the
outstanding, remarkable, stupendous, super, topic. The emotive words are underlined in
superb, terrific, tremendous, wonderful the example below:
HINT: Use a thesaurus to help you find Defenceless animals are often cruelly used
more words. in pointless experiments.

Alliteration The Power of Three
This is when a series of words next to or People tend to remember things in threes and
near to each other all begin with the same lists of three things create a pleasant rhythm.
letter. It gives a ‘catchy’ sound and can make This is why the ‘power of three’ is used a lot.
a phrase stand out (useful when you write to These examples use the ‘Power of Three’:
entertain, describe or to persuade). Stop, look and listen.
Charles cheerfully chewed his apple. He is strong, he is handsome and he is rich.
Get to grips with your grammar! Animals need warmth, shelter and food.

Use the ‘Traffic light’
Sentence Starters system to colour in the
Start your sentences in different ways: Here are some examples: boxes next to each target
Starting with a verb: Looking around the room, Tom saw his friend. in the table:
Starting with a noun: Water was gushing from the broken pipe. GREEN = I can do this.
Starting with an adjective: Slimy slugs were crawling over the salad. YELLOW = I can sometimes
Starting with an adverb: Carefully, Mr Singh opened the box. do this.
Starting with a conjunction: Since it was raining, they didn’t go out. RED = I can’t do this.

Similes and Metaphors SELF-ASSESSMENT FOR DECORATING TOOL
Similes compare one thing to another using I have used some ‘WOW’ words and/ or ‘emotive’
‘like’ or ‘as’. words in my writing.
Ben plays rugby like a tiger! I have varied the way I start my sentences.
Her voice is like music to my ears. I have used the ‘Power of Three’ in my writing.
Metaphors compare one thing to another I have used ‘Facts and Stats’ or a rhetorical
without using ‘like’ or ‘as’. They make a question in my writing.
stronger statement than similes because they I have used a simile, a metaphor or alliteration in my
say one thing IS something else. writing.
Ben is a tiger when he plays rugby! My target for decorating:
Her voice is music to my ears.

Facts and Stats (Statistics)
Rhetorical Questions Quoting facts and statistics in your writing is a
Sometimes, you can ask a question without powerful way to ARGUE and PERSUADE. In an
expecting an answer (a rhetorical question). ENGLISH exam you can even make up some facts
This makes your reader THINK and is useful and statistics (as long as they sound reasonable).
when writing to PERSUADE. Mrs Knowitall found that 99% of students who
Why do people think animals are stupid? use the ‘WRITING TOOLBOX’ improve their
Isn’t it sad to see so many homeless people? English grades.

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