"Lawd! Lawd! Lawd!"

playing with dialects while
reviewing dialogue punctuation

Student Writer Instructions:

Flowers for Algernon begins with Charlie Gordon writing about his thoughts and feelings. The “dialect” of Charlie’s voice grabs the reader’s attention. The reader tries to understand what kind of person would write like this. This is one way to develop character in a story.

For this writer’s challenge you will find different dialects/sayings and characters by pushing the buttons below. You will write one dialogue sentence, using the special spelling and special words of the dialect/sayings. You will also punctuate the dialogue correctly. You will neatly copy this sentence onto a page in your writers notebook that you have labeled: Dialects and Dialogue.

Throughout the year, you will be invited to print other perfectly-punctuated dialogue sentences that use dialects on this page

Near the end of the year , you will expand one of the dialogue sentences into an extended dialogue dialogue scene. The third button below may give you ideas for conversation topics.

Press the three buttons below until you create a random character that seems interesting to you. What kind of dialect might that person have?

Write a line of dialogue from this character that SHOWS us an interesting detail about the character is, uses a DIALECT, and PUNCTUATES CORRECTLY.