Grade 2 · Writing · Lesson 20

Add Dialogue to Make Stories Lively

Dialogue is the words a character says out loud. Adding dialogue to a story gives characters a real voice — the reader can hear them speak instead of just being told what happened. It turns a flat story into a lively one!

What this lesson teaches

1Add dialogue to a story using quotation marks around the exact spoken words
2Place the end punctuation mark (. ? !) inside the closing quotation mark
3Use a varied speaker tag verb — whispered, exclaimed, cheered — instead of always "said"

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