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Show, Don’t Tell

Show, Don’t Tell. Making the reader “see”. Illustrate. Turn the abstract into the concrete by using anecdotes (short stories), examples, or description. Telling : I want to become a doctor because I care about people .

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Show, Don’t Tell

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  1. Show, Don’t Tell Making the reader “see”

  2. Illustrate • Turn the abstract into the concrete by using anecdotes (short stories), examples, or description.

  3. Telling: I want to become a doctor because I care about people. Showing: I do know that the patients want to talk. They want to talk about their children, soap operas, even my hometown and roommates, basically anything but their medical condition. I am happy to oblige. I love to talk and am as comfortable talking about whether Brad and Angelina will get married as whether Bill and Hillary will get divorced.

  4. Telling: I’ve always wanted to help people. Showing: I remember the ladies at CM Retirement Home looking forward to my piano concerts even though I played the same three songs every week throughout fifth grade. By eighth grade I was volunteering at ChildServe, a residential home for children with special heath care needs in chronic developmental and physical conditions. Some of the children communicated by blinking, had frequent seizures, or couldn't control their movements. Even as an eighth-grader I felt completely comfortable with these children, playing dolls and reading stories.

  5. Be specific • Avoid generalized language. • Choose precise nouns and active verbs; particularize nouns with strong modifiers (adjectives, adverbs, phrases, clauses) • Tap the senses.Use fresh, evocative language to connect with readers.

  6. Telling: The woman was sick. She didn’t look lively at all. She showed symptoms of illness. She clearly was not herself. Showing: The woman curled up on the bed, unmoving. A sticky film covered her half-closed eyes. Her once shiny brown hair appeared tangled and matted. She breathed with a harsh, rattling sound.

  7. Telling: At my internship in Guadalajara, I saw a lot of people in poor conditions. It was overwhelming but ultimately fulfilling. Showing: In Guadalajara, families suffered from malnutrition and lack of clean drinking water. Though many had infections, antibiotics were scarce. For a week, the workdays were long, often ending well into the night, but the feeling of accomplishment tied up in my exhaustion made it all worth it. That feeling stays with me today and is part of my drive to becoming a doctor.

  8. Telling: The discipline I have for running relates to my pursuit of medicine. Showing: Pounding, rushing footsteps started to close in on me. The roar of the crowd echoed as I extended my hand to receive the baton… As I rounded the final stretch of track, I remember battling fatigue by contemplating two paths: slow down and give up my chance of winning to gain momentary comfort, or push myself even harder and give up momentary comfort to receive greater rewards. …

  9. Telling: No one in my family really is connected to medicine. Showing:My nearest medical relative was my grandmother's first cousin, Dr. Wentworth, who stitched my father's head together after a blow from his brand new Eddie Mathews' baseball bat. ...

  10. Telling: Biology is a great field, something that has played a big role in my decision to become a doctor. Showing: For me, the study of human biology, delving into details of how tissues and organs work together to adapt to the environment or to repair themselves, is not rote memorization. It is an appreciation of the amazing, almost inconceivable group of happy accidents that are necessary for human life. Biology is elegant and I love those "Aha!" moments when it seems that I have learned the secret code, the way things work.

  11. Showing, Not Telling • Revision, revision, revision

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