Review

Your blog topic today is to write a review for a book, movie, television series, song, album, product, video game, website, or for the performance of your favourite sports team this season. Below are some tips on how to approach your review. For more details you can go to the sites that these ideas were taken from. Links to both sites are on this blog under "helpful websites". You are allowed to write a positive or a negative review. If you want to see an example of a very creative review then look under "Websites of Interest" for "Sample Blog: Review".

1. Know what a review is. A review is not a recap of a TV episode or the plot of a book. It isn't just listing the different features in a PC game or what songs are on a new CD. Those things might be included in your review, but they are not the main event. Writing critically means you must tell people what is good or bad about your subject matter, and you need to provide specific evidence to back up your opinion.

2. As yourself "what does the reader want to know"? Think of the questions that a reader is likely to ask themselves about a movie, book, or song.

3. Decide on the overall point that you want to get across to the reader. Decide on an overall basic opinion of the product, such as "A hilarious, if overly long movie. Just don't expect anything groundbreaking"...and use this as a frame for your review. Hang everything else off this one idea. How does the movie's acting influence this opinion? Why isn't the plot that groundbreaking?

4. Don't write about yourself; the review is about the band, book, movie, or whatever you're reviewing.

5. Ask yourself, "what makes my review unique?" What is your unique selling point for this particular "product"?

6. Compare to other similar products, but not too much!

7. Be specific. What is unique about the experience of watching this movie, cheering for this team, reading this novel, or listening to this band?

8. Don't be afraid to state the obvious. Your readers might not be as familiar with your subject as you are. Don't be afraid to give a little extra description about things that you already know.

9. Be honest.

Creative Pursuits

You have a choice of two tasks for today's blog:

Your first option is to work on descriptive writing, specifically using as much imagery as possible. First, you must find a picture on the internet. Find something that you can translate into words (something with movement or colour or emotion) and then describe it in AS MUCH DETAIL as you can. Don't just describe what you see. Fill in the gaps and add tastes, sounds, and textures. Imagine that the reader does not have the picture in front of them, and yet you must make them feel as if they are in that photo. When you are finished, please look at at least 2 other classmates' blogs, and comment on them. See the link in the sidebar for an example of an excellent blog post on this topic.

Your second option is to create a random piece of creative writing. In the sidebar are links to two websites with hundreds of creative writing prompts. Choose one of them, and start writing. Of course, if this is too restrictive, you may write on a topic of your choice.