Sketch Your Subject

At the end of this lesson, you'll add some masterpiece sentences to your short story draft. You can add completely new sentences, or you can add on to sentences that already appear in your draft. To turn a so-so sentence into a masterpiece, follow the six steps described in the videos on this page and the next page.

First, watch the entire video for Step 1. Then, click the next button to watch the video for Step 2, and so on.

All right, artists, let's get ready to create our first masterpiece sentence. The first step is to sketch the sentence. So let's look at what we're going to be describing. It is a beautiful photo. Hey, there it is. And get a good look at it, because we're going to be thinking about it a lot.

Now let's hang that up on the wall. And we're going to sketch our sentence just like any first draft of a painting. It's very simple-- just to get a rough idea so let's think about the subject of this sentence.

What's doing something in this sentence? That's right, birds. And just very, very simply, what do the birds do? They fly. So our first sentence, simple as can be-- "The birds fly." We've got our subject, which is "the birds," and our predicate. How easy is this? What do they do? They fly.

Now we're going to keep our verbs in the present tense for this exercise. You can, of course, make yours in the past tense if you like-- "The birds flew." But just for simplicity's sake, we're going to keep it in the present tense. Step 1 is done. On to step 2.

Transcript

This sentence could use a lot of work. And the next step is to paint the predicate where we get to answer these questions, How? When? And where?

So our verb is fly. So how did these birds fly? When and where did they fly? Answering these questions will really help us describe the scene more effectively.

So the first one is, how are they flying? Look at these birds. Look at their wings here. Their wings are all spread out. So let's say that they are flying with wings outstretched. Yeah, that doesn't sound too bad.

And when are they flying? Well, the sun seems like it's pretty close to the horizon. It could be sunset in this picture or sunrise. Let's say sunset. At sunset.

And where are they flying? Well, it's a little dark but, you can see here, there are some waves underneath them. They're flying over the sea. So let's say over the waves. And now, we've got a much better idea of what's happening in the predicate of this sentence. So we'll put it all together.

The birds fly with wings outstretched at sunset over the waves. Very nice. And keep in mind that this whole part is still our predicate. We're just filling in the details of it.

So think we've done a pretty good job at painting the predicate. Let's move on to step three.

Transcript

One of the great things about language is that you can pick up the pieces and move them all around. Try and experiment with emphasizing different ideas, so you can put the subject before the predicate, or you can put the predicate before the subject, or you could split the predicate up and try different compositions. And when you think about a composition, think about maybe a musician, who decides where all the musical notes go and who plays what part at what time or to go with our metaphor here, the idea of a painter figuring out where on the page the subject is going to go and where all the little elements are going to be placed to get the maximum effect.

So this is what this step is all about-- step three, Experimenting with Composition. And what we can do is we can take these pieces like a puzzle and rearrange them and move them around and just kind of see how it sounds, so we're going to experiment. We're going to try some things out. Right now we have, "The birds fly with wings outstretched at sunset over the waves." But we can change that. We could emphasize how they're doing it, so they're doing it with wings outstretched, the birds fly over the waves at sunset. Or we could emphasize where they're doing it-- over the waves at sunset, the birds fly with wings outstretched.

Or maybe we want to put the emphasis on when they're doing it. Whatever comes first usually gets the emphasis, so at sunset, with wings outstretched, the birds fly over the waves. That one sounds pretty good. So let's try to hang onto that composition as we move on to step four.

Transcript

How well can you recognize the kinds of verbs that make masterpiece sentences? Select the best, most vibrant verb for each sentence.

taps
steps
stomps
presses

"Stomps" is the best fit for a descriptive verb here, since it brings to mind a picture of someone stepping on the brake with all their might.

explode
wiggle
shrink
inflate

"Explode" is the most effective word for this idea, since it shows how powerful the emotion was.

upset
tease
avenge
betray

"Betray" evokes the feeling of shock, anger, and pain that someone might feel when catching their best friend kissing their girlfriend.

jumping
hurdling
dancing
going

"Hurdling" helps us picture the robot leaping over the cars and houses in the same way runners jump hurdles.

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