Page 223 - SpringBoard_ELA_Grade8_Flipbook

aCTIvITy 3.8
continued
presenting voices
My Notes
language and Writer’s Craft: Using Voice and Mood for Effect
Active Versus Passive Voice
When writing or speaking, active voice is usually preferred to passive voice. However, skilled writers and speakers use voice for effect, so sometimes it is more powerful to use the passive voice. Study the model below. How is the effect different in each sentence?
Passive: Relocation camps were used to destroy whole villages.
Active: The Nazis used the camps to empty whole villages of their citizens.
Active voice names the destroyers, passive voice hides the destroyers. Do you as a writer want to show responsibility or hide responsibility?
Mood
You learned in earlier units that conditional mood expresses a hypothetical situation while the subjunctive mood describes a state contrary to fact. When using the verb to be in the subjunctive, always use were rather than was.
For example:
Conditional Mood: I would have spoken out against the Nazis if I had been alive then.
Subjunctive Mood: If I were a prisoner in a concentration camp, would I survive?
As a class, create additional model sentences relating to the Holocaust. Use passive and active voice and conditional and subjunctive mood effectively and correctly.
Passive: Active: Conditional: Subjunctive:
WRITING to SOURCES
Narrative Writing Prompt
Think about the research you did on the experiences of one victim of the Holocaust. Draft one victim’s story using information from all four sections of the ID card.
Be sure to:
• Use narrative technique (dialogue, pacing, description, and reflection) to develop experiences, events, and/or characters.
• Establish a context and use first person point of view.
• Sequence events logically and naturally using your notes as a guide.
• Use voice and mood effectively.
196 SpringBoard® English Language Arts Grade 8
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