This document provides guidance on writing descriptive texts. It discusses key aspects of descriptive writing such as using vivid sensory details, precise language, and figurative devices like similes and analogies. Order of organization is also covered, including spatial, climactic, and topical orders. The document offers examples of descriptive phrases and a sample descriptive paragraph to illustrate these concepts. Descriptive writing is aimed at actively engaging readers using creative details.

1. WRITING
DESCRIPTIONS
English for Academic Purposes
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2. What is happening in this
picture
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3. What could you see?
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4. How are the son and the father
sleeping?
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5. Despite the deplorable conditions, the children
of the area learn to read and write under small
cloth tents and find recreation in mud, bricks and
dirty water…
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6. Living amidst filth, deprived of the
basic amenities of life, facing a
new challenge each day….
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7. Read the Model Description
A THOUGHT-PROVOKING VISIT: THE SLUMS
OF LAHORE
By Danish Mughal
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8. Descriptive Writing
 Descriptive writing provides an illustration of
people, places, events, situations, thoughts,
and feelings. Description presents sensory
information that makes writing come alive. It
expresses an experience that the reader can
actively participate in by using imagination.
Descriptive details aid in developing the overall
dominant impression
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9. The Dominant Impression
The dominant impression is a basic idea or
theme that the writer wants to express from
the complexity of the story’s construction.
A city, for example, can be described as
exciting or scary depending on carefully
chosen words, or from a subtly crafted mood.
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10. Characteristics of good
descriptive writing
1. Vivid sensory details
2. Precise language ( Use specific adjectives, nouns
and strong action verbs )
3. Order (spatial order, Climactic order, topical
order)
4. Figurative language (Analogies, Similes )
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11. Sensory Details
1. Sight: colors, shapes, sizes, patterns
2. Sound: loud or soft; harmonious or harsh;
pleasant or unpleasant
3. Smell: sweet or sour, pleasant or unpleasant,
aromatic or stinky
4. Taste: sweet, bitter, burning, spicy, bland
5. Touch (feel or emotion): hard, soft, rough,
smooth, hot, cold, dry, oily, sticky, sandpapery
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12. Order of organization
 Spatial order
 Climactic order (order of importance)
 Topical order
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13. Write a phrase that describes each of the following
words in sensory terms. Then note whether you are
describing the word through sight, hearing, smell,
touch, or taste.
 1. Mountains
 ______________________________________________________
____
 2. Fire
 ______________________________________________________
____
 3. Smoke
 ______________________________________________________
____
 4. Dress
 ______________________________________________________
____
 5. Biscuits
 ______________________________________________________
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14. Using Figurative Language
 Simile
 Analogies
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15. Simile
 A simile uses the words “like” or “as” to
compare one object or idea with another to
suggest they are alike.
Example: busy as a bee
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16. Analogy
 An analogy is a comparison between one
thing and another, typically for the purpose
of explanation or clarification.
Example : I feel like a fish out of water
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17. Activity…
 Similes
 Analogies
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18. Sample Description
 It was very early in the morning. The eastern mountains were
blue-black, but behind them the light stood up faintly colored
at the mountain rims with a washed red, growing colder,
grayer and darker as it went up and overhead until, at a place
near the west, it was merged with pure night. And it was cold,
not painfully so, but cold enough so that I rubbed my hands
and shoved them deep into my pockets, and I hunched my
shoulders up and scuffled my feet in the ground. Down in the
valley where I was, the earth was that lavender gray of dawn.
I walked along a country road and ahead of me I saw a tent
that was only a little lighter gray than the ground. Beside the
tent there was a flash of orange fire seeping out of the cracks
of an old rusty iron stove. Gray smoke spurted up and out of
the stubby stovepipe, spurted up a long way before it spread
out and dispersed.
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19. Sample Description
 Then the tent flap jerked up and a young
man came out and an older man followed
him. They were dressed in new blue
dungarees and in new dungaree coats with
the brass buttons shining. They were sharp-
faced men, and they looked much alike. The
younger had a dark stubble beard and the
older had a gray stubble beard. Their heads
and faces were wet, their hair dripped with
water, and water stood on their stiff beards
and their cheeks shone with water.
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20. Sample Description
Microcredit involves lending small amounts of money to
very poor people who have a plan for a small business.
Here are only a few types of small businesses that poor
people have started with the help of microcredit: husking
rice, making ice-cream sticks, repairing radios, making
mustard oil, cultivating jackfruit, weaving, opening a small
store, raising a few animals such as cows, chickens, or
pigs, sewing or mending clothes for people, and brewing
beer. Perhaps the greatest thing about microcredit is that it
allows people to immediately use skills that they already
have.
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21. Descriptive Assignment
 Write a 300 words long description of ‘ Life
in slums of Pakistan”. You may use the
following words in your assignment:
hole
hovel
joint
mess
shack
shanty
slum
sty
abject
avaricious
base
black
calculated
corrupt
covetous
degenerate
degraded
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22. Good Luck with Writing
Description
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