5.18 Editing to Match Sound to Meaning

CONNECTION You know it is important to edit for misspellings and to indent. You know it is important to read and fix.

TEACHING POINT Today I want to teach you that you can also read your piece out loud to edit for mood, tone, and feelings.

TEACHING Listen to Julia’s piece I stood on the platform. I watched the swimmers speed across the water. I looked down at my dad. I reached to him. I let his hands carry me into the water. “Don’t let go!” I cried out. I clung to my dad’s neck with both hands.

TEACHING Listen to Julia’s piece I stood on the platform. I watched the swimmers speed across the water. I looked down at my dad. I reached to him. I let his hands carry me into the water. “Don’t let go!” I cried out. I clung to my dad’s neck with both hands. Did you notice how many of Julia’s sentences start the same way? Julia needs to decide if she wants those parts to sound the same. What feelings is she trying to show? She wants to show the action and movement going on around her but also how she’s focused on her dad…

TEACHING Swimmers sped into and out of the water, making quiet splashes with each stroke and creating short, rough waves.

TEACHING Communicating Ideas Through the Sound of Our Sentences Vary the way we begin our sentences Vary the length of sentences

ACTIVE ENGAGEMENT Look over your draft. Where might you vary your sentences? For example, Sirah wrote about her sister getting stuck on the train alone: The doors of the train shut. I saw my sister concealed behind them. She was alone. I didn’t know what to do. I watched the train pull away. Then she edited it to say: Slam! The train doors shut behind me as I stepped from the train onto the platform. My sister wasn’t next to me where she had been a moment ago! When I turned to find her, the subway started with her in it. All I could see was…

LINK Remember to read your work aloud to yourself and ask “Does this sound the way I want it to? Does it communicate my ideas?”

MIDWORKSHOP Punctuation can also change mood or meaning. Night in the Country By Cynthia Rylant And, if you lie very still, you may hear an apple fall from the tree in the back yard. Listen: Pump! Colon sets you up to listen. Exclamation makes the single sound (normally a quiet sound) ring out.

SHARE Work with a partner to edit.