Creating an advertisement
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Overview
Using this Resource
Connecting to the Curriculum
Marking Student Responses
Working with Students
Further Resources
This task is about putting adjectives in the correct order.
A friend is selling some shoes online. Here’s how he ordered the adjectives he wanted to use in his advertisement:
| opinion | condition | colour | style | material | purpose |
| unusual | slightly scuffed | red | retro | vinyl | dancing |
Then he added the noun: shoes . So, his advertisement read:
Unusual, slightly scuffed, red, retro, vinyl dancing shoes for sale.
Task administration:
This task can be completed with pencil and paper or online.
This resource is one of three similar resources that require students to think about the order in which they write a series of adjectives. All have a shared task at the end, where a partner is asked to comment on the writing and meaning-making. In this resource, students create meaning within an advertisement. In the resources A school of fish and Describing an aurora, students create meaning within poetry.
While the primary focus of these resources is on the ordering of adjectives, other areas to work on in written language have emerged as part of their trial, for example, the structural and language features of poetic writing, and punctuation.
Level:
4
Curriculum info:
Key Competencies:
Keywords:
Description of task:
Students are given an example of ordering adjectives in an advertisement. They use this example to develop a list of adjectives that they order as they create their own advertisement .
Curriculum Links:
Links to the Literacy Learning Progressions for Writing:
This resource helps to identify students’ ability to:
- generate content that is relevant to the task
- demonstrate knowledge of how language works
as described in the Literacy Learning Progressions for Writing at: http://www.literacyprogressions.tki.org.nz/The-Structure-of-the-Progressions.
Learning Progression Frameworks
This resource can provide evidence of learning associated with within the Writing Learning Progressions Frameworks.
Read more about the Learning Progressions Frameworks.Answers/responses:
This resource was trialled by 60 Year 7 and 8 students. The resource models the ordering of adjectives in the categories of opinion, condition, colour, style, material, and purpose. In the first task, students decide what they would like to sell. Then they create a list of ordered adjectives for their item under the same categories.
In the trial, most students were able to think of an appropriate adjective of opinion. The adjectives ranged from nice, pretty, and good, to gorgeous, comfortable, and stylish - to list a few. The other categories produced a similar range of responses. As the categories were given in the appropriate order for this task, students did not exercise their judgement as to the "correct"order.
In tasks two and three, students use their chosen adjectives to create their own advertisement.
Please note that student responses given below have not been corrected.
Using given model to order adjectives correctly
- Across the tasks, over a half of the trial students kept their adjectives in the order that was modelled and in which they had placed their chosen adjectives.
- Some trial students changed the order of their chosen adjectives. As a consequence, their advertisements tended to sound somewhat convoluted. For example, the student who chose these adjectives to describe the saddle they had for sale Comfortable / Brand new / Black / English / Leather / Show jumping went on to create this advertisement: A brand new show jumping saddle that is black leather is very comfortable is now on sale for $200.
- A few trial students changed their choice of adjectives. For example, the student who chose these adjectives to describe the dress they had for sale Pretty / New / Pink / Drop tail / Cotton / Casual went on to create this advertisement that is made up of a string of adjectives of opinion: The dress is really conforable [comfortable] to wear and is very stylish and very awesome.
Using appropriate punctuation between adjectives
- A few trial students used commas between their adjectives correctly. For example: Great, 2nd-hand, bright green, casual silk t-shirt for everyday wear for sale.
- Some trial students were not consistent with their use of commas. For example: Nice ,old, blue ,skinny, denim jeans for sale, price $20.00.
- Some trial students used no commas between their adjectives. For example: a cool slightly scratched black rugged carbon jump bike.
Reviewing and improving written work
In creating their own advertisements, some students demonstrated their ability to improve their writing in this genre, adding details and punctuation. For example:
| Create an advertisement | Review of advertisement, adding information and/or punctuation |
| There is a colourful, new, rainbow coloured, lace-up canvas, cotton shoe for sale | Come along to Number One Shoes for a limited edition colourful, new, rainbow coloured, lace-up canvas, cotton shoe for sale !!! |
| buy a striking new blue riboned vintage straw hat to keep you head cool in the sun |
Buy a striking new blue ribboned vintage straw hat to keep you head cool in the sun. Perfect for sunny days at the beach! |
The shared task
In the partner task at the end, a few trial students commented that their partner's order of the adjectives sounded right; some partners commented on the advertisement itself, the meaning-making part of the task; some partners suggested structural and/or language feature improvements that could be made. Such feedback can provide teachers with ideas for their next steps with students.
Teaching and learning:
Ordering adjectives correctly
Adjectives fall into different groups or categories, depending on the aspect of the noun that they describe (for example, colour, shape, or size). If two or more adjectives describe a noun, they are usually placed in a particular order, depending on which category they belong to. Help students to notice the order in which adjectives are usually written.
With the adjectives that are generated as part of the first task, experiment with placing them in different orders in front of the noun. For example, compare ‘shabby red cotton scarf’ with ‘cotton shabby red scarf. Discuss which order sounds best.
With the adjectives that are generated as part of the first task, experiment with placing them in different orders in front of the noun. For example, compare ‘shabby red cotton scarf’ with ‘cotton shabby red scarf. Discuss which order sounds best.
Using punctuation between adjectives correctly
In a list of adjectives describing the same noun, commas are used to separate the adjectives that are coordinate (adjectives that have equal weight in describing the noun). You can tell if two adjectives are coordinate by:
1 - swapping them around. Does the sentence still make sense?
2 - putting ‘and’ between them. Does the sentence still make sense?
If the answer is ‘yes’, the adjectives are coordinating and need a comma between them.
Test this out with the sentence ‘The velvety night sky was awash with colour.’
1 – Swap the adjectives around: ‘The night velvety sky was awash with colour.’ Does this sound right? No – so no comma is needed between ‘velvety’ and ‘night’.
2 – Put ‘and’ between the adjectives: ‘The velvety and night sky was awash with colour.’ Does this sound right? No – so no comma is needed.
Test it out again with another sentence: ‘The dancing flickering lights streaked across the sky.’
1 – Swap the adjectives around: ‘The flickering dancing lights streaked across the sky.’ Does this sound right? Yes – so a comma is needed between ‘dancing’ and ‘flickering’.
2 – Put ‘and’ between the adjectives: ‘The dancing and flickering lights streaked across the sky.’ Does this sound right? Yes – so a comma is needed.
1 - swapping them around. Does the sentence still make sense?
2 - putting ‘and’ between them. Does the sentence still make sense?
If the answer is ‘yes’, the adjectives are coordinating and need a comma between them.
Test this out with the sentence ‘The velvety night sky was awash with colour.’
1 – Swap the adjectives around: ‘The night velvety sky was awash with colour.’ Does this sound right? No – so no comma is needed between ‘velvety’ and ‘night’.
2 – Put ‘and’ between the adjectives: ‘The velvety and night sky was awash with colour.’ Does this sound right? No – so no comma is needed.
Test it out again with another sentence: ‘The dancing flickering lights streaked across the sky.’
1 – Swap the adjectives around: ‘The flickering dancing lights streaked across the sky.’ Does this sound right? Yes – so a comma is needed between ‘dancing’ and ‘flickering’.
2 – Put ‘and’ between the adjectives: ‘The dancing and flickering lights streaked across the sky.’ Does this sound right? Yes – so a comma is needed.