Teaching Characterization With Lists of Descriptive Terms – Primary Grades Through College Students

Posted on April 8th, 2009, by Meggin McIntosh, Ph.D.

Regardless of the age level of your students, you are teaching characterization of one type or another. It may be through traditional literature study or it may be through the examination and analysis of political figures. By using a list of 1001 Descriptors, some of which are shown below, you can open up words and meanings to students so that they experience and express characterization in a far more expansive way than they would have otherwise. From a huge list I created for my own use (and that you could create for yourself, too), here are just a sample of the “A” words:

able
abstemious
academic
activist
adaptive
addled
adept
adjunct
adolescent
advanced
affluent
afraid
African
aggravated
aggressive
agitated
agrarian
alien
aloof
alternate
amateur
ambivalent
Amerasian
amiable
amicable
ancient
androgynous
angelic
Anglo
Anglo-Indian
Anglo-Irish
annoyed
antagonistic
anti-______________
antiquated
anxious
apprehensive
appropriate
apt
aristocratic
Aristotelian
Armenian
artsy
ascetic
Asian
assertive
assistant
assured
atrophied
autocratic
autodidactic
autosuggestible

Regardless of whether you teach young students, middle grade students, or right on through the college level, you can use lists of descriptive words (appropriate for your students’ learning levels) to enhance and expand your teaching of characterization. A few suggestions for using a list of descriptors for narrative and expository text follow.

Narrative Text

If you have your students read any type of narrative text (poetry, short stories, children’s literature, novels, etc.) as part of your content, then creating or having a list of 1001 Descriptors is perfect for use in your classroom literature study. Learners can use words from this list to describe more precisely the characters in a short story or novel.

Also, since one of the reasons that you have students read children’s literature, poetry, young adult literature, short stories, and/or novels is to expand their vocabulary, then using an expansive list of great words gives you an opportunity to do just that. You might have the full list of 1001 Descriptors available for the students to access during their literature study or just a portion of that list.

Let’s say that one of the characters in this story is old and you let students know that the word ‘old’ will not be acceptable to you when they are characterizing this person, creature, or animal. Maybe students will then look through the list and find the word “ancient” to use instead. Maybe that same character is also ‘gruff’ and you want them to learn a new word that has a similar meaning to ‘gruff’ but is in fact a better and more accurate descriptor, for example the word ‘curmudgeonly.’ Using either a list of great words, or getting students to use the tool found at www.MyFavoriteThesaurus.com, helps them find and experiment with alternative ways of describing a person, animal, or some other being that they want to characterize.

One of the positive outcomes (unplanned) that I noticed in my literature classes when I did this type of activity, especially when students found words that were fun to say (e.g., ‘curmudgeonly’), is that they would end up making statements to each other about how ‘curmudgeonly’ (or some other new and interesting word) their classmate (or another teacher) was behaving. All I could do was laugh when this happened (and smile on the inside at the same time).

Expository Text

Teaching characterization (and using the 1001 Descriptors list) is not just for literature study. If you are having students describe and discuss various political figures, historical figures, or other current or past individuals, then using a massive list of descriptors provides words students can learn and use that will more specifically depict whoever it is that they need to characterize. When I taught high school US History, we used lists of interesting descriptors because I wanted my students’ vocabularies to be expanding consistently and continuously.

Another idea to help your learners with their awareness and ultimate use of sophisticated vocabulary is to ask them to listen to (and watch) the news to hear how various newscasters characterize the current political figures. To ramp it up even further, they could listen for the differences in the words that commentators on one network use vs. the words that commentators on a different network use – all when ‘characterizing’ the same person.

With all the fabulous shows on TV, you could assign the children, young adults, or adults that you teach to watch a show on the Discovery Channel or the History Channel (e.g., “Biography”) and have them take note of particular words that were used to characterize those individuals. They could bring all those words into class the next day to compile with their fellow classmates – and then find on the 1001 Descriptors list or to add to the list.

For the advanced students you might even have them segment the 1001 Descriptors list into those words that were more likely to have been used in past times rather than in current times. In addition there would be students who would be interested in finding out about certain words that did not appear in the past but moved into the modern vernacular based on a particular event or political movement.

Tying in characterization terms with other subject areas is just one more possibility. For example the word ‘octogenarian’ and ‘nonagenarian’ are both on the list. Certainly in a mathematics class, you can make connections by looking at the word roots. It helps when students see connections between and among their various subject areas (rather than thinking that each one is discrete).

Have fun with this. Learning new words – and using these new words – is a blast! Be a model of that fascination for seeking, finding, and then using the precise word for what you are trying to say when characterizing yourself and others. You can certainly amass your own list of these words or access the one that I created.

If you want a PDF copy of the *1001 Descriptors,* which includes numerous teaching ideas and suggestions, just go to http://www.OwningWordsforLiteracy.com and click on the Downloads tab. You’ll see a variety of items there (and most are free) to access for your classroom or other use (PowerPoint shows, Word documents, and PDFs).

Educators have the most influential positions in our society – and need every bit of support that can be mustered. Another resource that will help increase educators’ sense of peaceful, predictable productivity are these free weekly emails:

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Through her company, Emphasis on Excellence, Inc., Meggin McIntosh changes what people know, feel, dream, and do via seminars, workshops, writing, coaching, and consulting.

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