Simile as literary device

1. What are Similes???
Are similes like smiles?
The words look almost
alike.
No, that’s not it.
Oh! If we just learned about the poetic
device of alliteration, I bet this is another one of
those.
Let’s check it out.

2. Whenever you write, you are giving other
people information. The information is
usually descriptive in some way.
In poetry, your words must be VERY
DESCRIPTIVE.
But what if the person you tell the
information to doesn’t have the same
picture in his or her head that you do??

3. freedigitalpicture.net
Or if you state that
something is soft, you
might mean like this little
kitten.
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But what your reader
“sees”
is a roaring Bengal
tiger!!
So the simile to make your meaning clear would

4. How are you going to give
readers a “picture” with your
words that will help them “see”
what you are talking about more
clearly.
One way is by using
comparisons to things that your

5. So we can see that one way writers
make the images they use clear is
by using one of the poetic devices
called similes.
Remember -
Similes are just taking two
things that aren’t very alike at all
and showing a comparison of
the two using like or as between
them in the sentence.

6. For instance, if I wanted to write about one of the
three bears’ beds that was too hard to sleep on, you
wouldn’t really know how hard the bed
was. You might picture a firm mattress
which many people like to sleep on
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But if I use a simile and say,
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“That the bed is hard as a rock,”
then you get a picture of just how hard
the bed really is, right?

7. You already use similes to give clearer
pictures of what you talk about to others -
What about eating Mexican food with hot
peppers in the meat?? You could use a
simile to describe it to your grandma –
“Grandma, the Mexican food we had was
good, but it was hot as a fire cracker!”
Now your grandma knows why you had to
drink so much water at dinner 

8. How about that!! You hear similes all the time,
like…
Your coat with the fur lining is as warm as
toast.
Those puppies are as cute as a button.
This storm looks bad – The sky is dark as the
inside of my closet.
We tried to go swimming at the lake, but the water
was cold as ice cubes so we got out.

9. Now you know what similes really are –
comparing two things using like or as that
aren’t alike to create a picture for your reader
–
Let’s all listen today and see how many similes
you hear and share the best one with me
tonight 
I’ll be a watching for the best simile I
receive.