Take a peek at the remarkable collection of ADJECTIVES we’ve gathered during the month of February.

Let’s take a couple of seconds to marvel at these ADJECTIVES and recall their meanings. These words and all words that beautifully define reading, writing, speaking and feeling are your children’s best friends. This is what LITERACY is all about. Awesome, descriptive words will always be there when needed. In fact, let’s have a little best friend word party and invite our last 2 adjectives:

1. agile
2. azure
3. bay
4. blithe
5. camel
6. colossal
7. drowsy
8. defiant
9. elfin
10. enormous
11. faulty
12. flawless
13. golden
14. grizzly
15. heather
16. heliotrope
17. inimitable
18. inquisitive
19. jocular
20. jubilant
21. keen
22. knightly
23. lackadaisical
24. leonine
25. malevolent
26. malodorous
27. nimble
28. nonchalant
29. obstinate
30. ornery
31. piebald
32. pluvial
33. querulous
34. quotidian
35. rebellious
36. red
37. silent
38. solemn
39. translucent
40. treasured
41. ursine
42. utmost
43. valiant
44. venomous
45. wily
46. wry
47. xenophobic
48. xiphioid
49. yellow
50. youthful
51. zestful
52. zigzag
53. silver
54. swift
AND today’s
55. glaze
56. white

I like endings and beginnings to blend, so today’s 2 Adjectives that end our 56 Adjectives Project come from the beginning of our 31 Poems Project in the poem The Red Wheelbarrow:

The Red Wheelbarrow by William Carlos Williams

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens

—————————

1. glazed – having a surface covered with a glaze; lustrous; smooth; glassy. What to love about this word? glazed derives from the word glass and generally defines a glassy appearance.  Think glazed donuts, that lustrous mixture of milk and powdered sugar. Kids will understand this kind of glazed!  All kinds of things can be described as glazed… eyeballs, ponds, rivers, furniture, windows, paper, foods such as ham, nuts, fruits, cereals… anything that has a shiny outer covering.  Examples:  a)  The boy’s glazed eyeballs told of his sadness.  b)  The glazed paper was too slippery to write on.  c)  The glazed chocolate donut looked almost too pretty to eat. Look around with your kids today to find glazed things.

We bumped into the word glazed in the poem The Red Wheelbarrow all the way back on Day 1 of 365 Days of Literacy for Kids. Poet William Carlos Williams describes the red wheelbarrow as glazed with rain water… think covered, smooth, glassy, lustrous with rain water.  The simple word glazed gives us this rich, beautiful image.  One word can mean so much in our writing.  Encourage your children to use glazed.  Have fun finding (and eating) glazed things!

2.  white – of the color of snow or milk;  having that color produced by reflection, transmission or emission of light in the proportion in which they exist in the complete visual spectrum without absorption, therefore being less fully illuminated and devoid of any distinctive hue. What to love about this word? Without having to memorize all of the above, the word white says it all. You can grab a color chart to show your children the many shades of white… making white a bit more interesting… beige, cream, eggshell, ivory, off-white, pearl, seashell, vanilla.

But there are times when white means white.

We bumped into white in the poem The Red Wheelbarrow (above).  The poet writes beside the white chickens. This is a case where white means white. Poets choose their words very specifically to create the visuals and the meanings they want projected to the world.  Poet William Carlos Williams takes the simple, pure concept of a rain-glazed wheelbarrow standing beside some white chickens and creates the complex pure of life itself.  The white chickens are the beautiful contrast to the red of the wheelbarrow.  The visual of the chickens as beige or eggshell or off-white has no strength.  The word white is specific.  white gives us definition even in its lack of definition.  Discuss the color white with your kids.  Grab a color chart and see for yourselves the colors of white.  When using white in writing or speaking, think of those white chickens in the poem.  Encourage your kids to create strong visuals through their words… especially with specific colors!

glazed.  white. Again, 2 words that seem so simple on the outside, but pack such powerful images.

WORDS.  WORDS.  WORDS.  February has been the month of 56 Adjectives. 56 words.  Visit them often.

Remember that kids love words.  Kids LOVE words.  Kids love to know about words and kids love to use words.  Give your kids the gift of words every day.

And remember, too, that LITERACY is all about WORDS – Written, Spoken, Felt.

Tomorrow, we begin our 31 Letters Project.  Join us as your words delight some special children in your life!