Introduction
You want to teach one of your peers about tone or mood in texts. Your best tactic in doing this is teaching them about what words they can look for to distinguish what kind of mood you are trying to portray.
This allows you for a lot of room for creativity and you get to talk about anything you want that you think will help your fellow peer.
Task
With the given words below, write a one page story using those words portraying at least two different moods. You can use as many words as you want and you can write about anything you want.
Remember, your peer will be reading this and needs to understand your story. Don't try to be too complex in your plot or in how you portray your characters.
Positive: adoring, affectionate, calm, cheerful, confident, ecstatic, funny, comic, hopeful, passionate, sympathetic, romantic
Neutral: direct, questioning, understated *only use these if you are very specific and sure about their purpose*
Negative: angry, annoyed, anxious, bitter, blunt, confused, depressed, fearful, forceful, girm, harsh, hopeless
Process
- The student will read the directions and look over the list of words that relate to different tones/moods
- The student will open a Word document and use words from the lists to write a short story encorporating two different moods
- The student will then share their story with a peer and ask them to talk about what they read and try to have them figure out the two moods that the story has.
Evaluation
| Creativity | Use of Words From List | Clarity | Peer Feedback |
| 5- Very creative with a lot of detail | 5- Use of 8+ words | 5- Clear plot and mood shifts | 5- Peer loves it and finds it easy to read and understand |
| 4- Creative with enough detail to fit the story | 4- Use of 6-7 words | 4- Clear plot, mood shifts could be worked on | 4- Peer likes the story and took a little bit longer to find mood shifts |
| 3- Needs improvement on details, but well thought of | 3- Use of 4-5 words | 3- Plot could be written clearer, mood shifts are hard to distinguish | 3- Peer likes the story but thinks it could be worked on more |
| 2- Not enough detail and needs more plot | 2- Less than 4 words used | 2- Plot does not make a lot of sense, mood shifts are unable to be found | 2- Peer struggled to read the story and identify mood shifts |
Conclusion
You've finished your creative short story, now share it with your friend! Once he/she is done reading and has written comments and given feedback, reflect on those comments and discussion.
What have you learned about writing with mood shifts?
Is it harder than you thought?
What can you do next time to improve your creative writing and your use of mood shifts?
Think about how certain words make a difference when you are reading a text and how one or two words can completely change the mood of a text.
Teacher Page
TN Standards Reached:
Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas develop and interact over the course of a text.
Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific word choices shape meaning or tone.
Assess how point of view or purpose shapes the content and style of a text.
Integrate and evaluate content presented in diverse formats and media, including visually and quantitatively, as well as in words.