1. Figurative Language
Personification

2. What is Figurative Language?
Here are some examples. What do you think figurative language means?​
The wind whispered softly through the trees.​ (personification)
The cafeteria pizza was a soggy, droopy piece of cardboard.​ (metaphor)
The teacher glared like a furious dragon.​ (simile)
Let the students talk about what they think figurative language is.
There are different kinds of figurative language, as demonstrated here. However, we will be focusing on personification in just a minute.

3. Figurative language expresses an idea that goes beyond the actual meaning of the words.
Okay, so… what does that mean? (rhetorical)

4. Figurative and Literal Language
Literally: words function exactly as defined​
The car is blue.​
He caught the football.​ ​
Figuratively:  figure out what it means​​
I’ve got your back.​
You’re a doll.​
   ^Figures of Speech​
It is easier to understand figurative language when we compare it to literal language.
*Define literal language.
These things are true; they are facts.
The car can be blue, and he can catch the football.
*Define figurative language
These things are not true. You do not literally have someone’s back in your hands, and you are not really a doll.
*What do these figures of speech mean?
*I support you, or I will watch out for you.
*You are a wonderful person

5. Personification Miss Noble…
Personification means to give human thoughts and qualities to nonhuman objects
​The sunflowers nodded in the wind.
The brown grass begged for water.
Miss Noble heard the last piece of cheesecake in the refrigerator calling her name.
Miss Noble…
Personification is a kind of figurative language.
*What about these examples makes them figurative and not literal?
*The sunflowers cannot nod because nodding is not an action inanimate objects can do. What does this sentence mean, then?
*The sunflower is bobbing in the wind; it moves because the wind is a force acting on the flower, not because the flower makes itself move.
*The brown grass cannot beg for water because begging is not an action inanimate objects can do. What does this sentence mean, then?
*The brown grass, or the dying grass, needs water in order to be healthy and green again. The grass is not literally crying out for water, but people can clearly see that it needs it.
The cheesecake cannot call her name because speaking is not an action inanimate objects can do. What does this sentence mean, then?
Miss Noble remembers that the cheesecake is in the refrigerator and has a huge desire to have it. If the cheesecake were literally calling out my name, I would probably run away screaming.

6. Credits (Sources)
examples/personification-examples/ nt