Using Other Words for: SAID

We might write short stories, fantasy, science fiction, lengthy novels, romance, but if we write fiction, then somewhere along the line we'll come up against the word, 'said'. Does using it fill you with despair?

There are abundant words to use instead, yet to be truthful, you're probably best not using them.
Readers pay such little attention to 'said’ it effectively becomes invisible. If you use an alternative, it can become conspicuous; it can make a declaration and say – hey guys, look at me, I’m important - and at worst, can downgrade your book.

If it’s understandable who is speaking, then remove it completely. It's surprising how much more professional your work will look - in fact, let's make a rule - if it's obvious who's speaking, don't use anything.

You should certainly only substitute other words for said if the story needs you to accentuate the way of speaking. Please remember, gorging your story with alternatives makes your work amateurish.

Look at published books and you'll find most authors steer clear of them. My suggestion is - stop thinking about other words for said. Wherever you can, don't use anything.
For all that, if you need other words for said and you’re struggling to catch that elusive substitute, here’s a list of words you might be interested in trying.

Other words for said in alphabetic order

• Accepted, Accused, Acknowledged, Admitted, Advertised, Affirm, Agonized, Agreed, Alleged, Announced, Answered, Appealed, Apply for, Arranged, Articulated, Asked, Asserted, Asseverate, Assumed, Assured, Attract, Aver, Avow,
• Barked, Bawl, Bawled, Beamed, Beckoned, Begged, Bellowed, Beseeched, Blubbered, Blurted, Bossed, Breathed, Broadcast,
• Cajole, Called, Carped, Cautioned, Censured, Chimed in, Choked, Chortled, Chuckled, Circulate, Claim, Comforted, Conceded, Concurred, Condemned, Confer, Confessed, Confided, Confirm, Consoled, Contend, Continued, Crave, Cried out, Criticized, Croaked, Crooned, Crowed,
• Declared, Defend, Demanded, Denote, Dictated, Disclosed, Disposed, Disseminate, Distribute, Divulged, Drawled,
• Emitted, Empathized, Encourage, Encouraged, Entreated, Exact, Exclaimed, Explained, Exposed,
• Faltered, Finished, Fumed,
• Gawped, Get out, Giggled, Given, Glowered, Grieved, Grinned, Groan, Groaned, Growled, Grumbled,
• Handed on, Held, Hesitated, Hinted, Hissed, Hollered, Howled,
• Impart, Implied, Implored, Importune, Inclined, Indicate, Informed, Inquired, Insisted, Interjected, Invited,
• Jabbered, Joked, Justified,
• Keened,
• Lamented, Laughed, Leered, Lilted,
• Maintained, Make known, Make public, Marked, Mewled, Mimicked, Moaned, Mocked, Mourned, Murmured, Mused
• Necessitated, Needed, Noted,
• Observed, Offered, Ordered,
• Passed on, Pleaded, Postulated, Preached, Premised, Presented, Presupposed, Proclaimed, Prodded, Professed, Proffered, Promised, Promulgated, Proposed, Protested, Provoked, Publicized, Published, Puled, Put forth, Put out,
• Quaked, Queried, Quipped, Quivered, Quizzed,
• Raged, Ranted, Reckoned that, Rejoiced, Rejoined, Released, Remarked, Remonstrated, Repeated, Replied, Reprimanded, Requested, Required, Requisition, Retorted, Revealed, Roared,
• Said, Sang, Scoffed, Scolded, Seethed, Sent on, Settled, Shared, Shed tears, Shouted, Shrieked, Shrugged, Shuddered, Snarled, Snivelled, Sobbed, Solicited, Sought, Specified, Spluttered, Spread, Stammered, Stated, Stuttered, Stressed, Suggested, Supposed, Swore,
• Taunted, Teased, Testified, Thundered, Ticked off, Told, Told off, Tore a strip off, Touted, Transferred, Transmitted, Trembled, Trumpeted,
• Understood, Undertook, Upbraided, Uttered,
• Verified, Vociferated, Voiced, Vouched for, Vouchsafe,
• Wailed, Wanted, Warned, Weep, Went on. Wept, Wheedle, Whimpered, Whined, Whispered,
• Yawped, Yelled, Yelped,Yowled

Ways of modifying other words for said

Okay, so you’ve decided you really do need to use other words for said. You’ve found one you like and are determined to insert it in your text.
In order to make your book absolutely zing, you might want to go the whole hog and add a few other words to modify just how said is meant to be perceived.
The way it works is, you choose whichever other word for said you fancy, from the list above, then add a word or phrase after it, from the list below. For example, "She promised, with a controlled smile", or "He remarked, with a gloomy sigh" - But do not overdo it. Be very careful with it's use.
Adverbs or phrases to use with the other words for said
Abruptly, Absently, Acidly, After a moments reflection, Agreed, Angrily, Announced, Apologetically, Approvingly, Artfully

• Broke in
• Calmly, Caustically, Cheerfully, Commented lightly, Complacently, Concurred thoughtfully, Crossly
• Didn’t question his judgement, Dryly
• Encouraged, Expression denoting disapproval
• False cheerfulness, Finished, Friendly fashion
• Gently, Grated, Grinned, Groaned, Gruffly
• Happily, Hotly
• Impatiently, In a casual tone, In a chiding tone, In a courteous manner In a curious tone, In a dry tone, In a flirtatious way, In a level tone In a level way, In a non committal way, In a perpetually tired voice In a quiet way, In a rasping tone, In a small panicky voice In a soothing tone, In an attempt to…, In quiet amazement, Indulgently, Informed in an easy tone, Innocently, Inquired doubtfully, Invited, Irritably
• Loftily, Loudly
• Made the effort to sound reassuring, Meaning the words more seriously than they sounded, Mentally shrugged
• Naturally, Nodded agreeably, Not wanting to sound pushy
• Offered, Offhandedly, Optimistically
• Pleasantly, Politely, Politely smooth, Probed Promised in a motherly/fatherly way, Prompted gently Promptly, Protested
• Quietly
• Reflectively, Roughly
• Sadly, Said sympathetically, She went on, Sincerely, Smiled faintly, Smugly, Soberly, Softly, Sounded slightly brittle, Sparingly, Speculated, Sternly, Suggested
• Tartly, Tautly, Teased softly, Tightly, Truthfully
• Uncertainly, Unexpectedly, Urgently
• Vaguely, Voice soft with affection
• Went on loyally, Wilfully misunderstood, With a controlled smile, With a fond smile, With a gloomy sigh, With a note of relief, With a sad grimace, With a sad smile, With a sense of guilt, With a sigh of irritation, With burgeoning excitement, With conviction, With determination, With fire, With firm persistence, With gentle remonstrance, With gentle teasing, With graceful simplicity, With mock astonishment, With pleasure, With quiet empathy With simple directness, Without sounding unduly curious, Wryly

Be careful when using other words for said
I hope this has been of some help. The list of other words for said is by no means comprehensive, and I’m sure everyone will want to add a few favourites – if you think of some, put them in the comments box, and if they're sensible I'll add them to the list - - But please, please, use other words for said and their modifying phrases and adverbs, with care.
If you feel you must use alternatives, use them judiciously
Be sensible, sprinkle other words for said occasionally, and your work might just sparkle - pour with gay abandon, and your work will sink.

SOURCE: AJ Barnett

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hetero = different, homo = same graph = writing, phone = speaking

Greek lesson
hetero = different, homo = same
graph = writing, phone = speaking (I use the word:sound)

most English words pairs are heterographic heterophones
hat, discipline

some English word pairs are
homographic homophones
same writing - same sounding
bank (place for money) vs. bank (side of river)

some English word pairs are
heterographic homophones
different writing - same sounding
sail sale
these are often called homonyms

some English word pairs are
homographic heterophones
same writing - different souning
tear (to rip), tear (a result of crying)

To accurately describe the ambiguity, you need a word to describe the writing and a word to describe the pronunciation (sound).
The term homophone could refer to bank vs. bank words or sail vs. sale words

I have a friend who did her masters on heterographic homophones and homographic heterophones. After the first time she did an oral presentation she always referred to them as bank-bank words vs. tear-tear words when presenting her work orally.

Very Short Sentence Examples from Literature and More

Frailty, thy name is woman!˜ William Shakespeare
Fortune favors the brave.˜ Virgil, Aeneid
Brevity is the soul of wit. William Shakespeare
"I have a dream..." Martin Luther King Jr.
"People that care don't mind." Dr. Seuss
"Adults are obsolete children." Dr. Seuss
"Waste is worse than loss." Thomas A. Edison
“Know thyself. ˜ Socrates
“Nothing gold can stay. ˜ Robert Frost
“Work is love made visible. ˜ Kahlil Gibran
“Science is what scientists do. (From Statistics as Principled Argument by R P Abelson, 1995)
“If it holds water, it's craft. If it leaks, it's art. (A standard line among potters)

MOVIES
Note: Let the kids guess which movie these come from!
“Laugh it up, Fuzzball. (Star Wars)
“Phone home. (ET, extra terrestrial)
“Make my day.
“I‚ll be back. (The Terminator)
“You shall not pass! (Lord of the Rings)
"I'm melting, mellllllting. .." (Wizard of Oz)
“Oh Gad!" (Life With Father 1947)
"I coulda been a contender." (On the waterfront 1954)
"Blood makes poor mortar." (The Ten Commandments 1956)
"So let it be written, So let it be done." (The Ten Commandments 1956)
"I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that." (2001: A Space Odyssey 1968)
"Here's looking at you, kid." (Casablanca 1942)
"We'll always have Paris." (Casablanca 1942)
"Round up the usual suspects." (Casablanca 1942)
"Play it, Sam. Play As Time Goes By." (Casablanca 1942)

SHAKESPEARE
“My heart Is true as steel. (A Midsummer Night‚s Dream, Act ii. Scene 1).
"There's daggers in men's smiles." - (Macbeth, Act II, Scene III).
"What's done is done." (Macbeth, Act III, Scene II).
"Fair is foul, and foul is fair." - (Macbeth, Act I, Scene I).
"I bear a charmed life." (Macbeth, Act V, Sc. VIII).
"Et tu, Brute!" (Julius Caesar, Act III, Scene I).
"Beware the ides of March". (Julius Caesar, Act I, Scene II).
“And thereby hangs a tale. (The Taming of the Shrew, Act iv. Scene 1).
“Tush! tush! fear boys with bugs. (The Taming of the Shrew, Act i. Scene 2).
"I 'll not budge an inch." (Taming of the Shrew, Induction, Scene I).
"Off with his head!" (Richard III, Act III, Scene IV).
“Are you good men and true? (Much Ado about Nothing, Act iii. Scene 3).

POOH
"Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit's clever."
"And he has Brain."
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit has Brain."
There was a long silence.
"I suppose," said Pooh, "that that's why he never understands anything."
[From The House at Pooh Corner by A A Milne, 1928]

Note: Here's a topic/clincher VSS!
"Now, what I want is, facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts.
Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything
else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing
else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I
bring up my own children, and this is the principle on which I bring up
these children. Stick to Facts, sir!" —Dickens-

The Writer's Jungle

The Writer’s Jungle in a nutshell 

SOURCE: http://www.bravewriter.com/program/home-study-courses/the-writers-jungle/

The Writer’s Jungle is much more than daily lesson plans or writing ideas. It takes you inside the writer’s world. The first nine chapters explain the necessary steps to brave writing, such as, how to read quality literature and discover the principles that make it work, what writer’s voice is and how to cultivate your child’s writing voice, freewriting and the power of unlocking a child’s mind life, your role in the revision and editing process, what to do about writer’s block (especially in resistant writers), how to keenly observe not only physical detail but ideas as well, and more.
It will help you become effective in determining how to use curricula you already own or help you become brave enough to create tailor-made writing projects for your children that go with your studies. Other chapters include how to identify dumb writing assignments and what to do about them, discerning the natural stages of growth in your young writer and creating writing projects suited to that stage of development, playing word games, sample yearly schedules for each stage of development and journal writing.
When I speak, I usually start by asking the audience how many writing manuals they already own. The most on record is eleven. Many own more than five. The reason homeschoolers keep searching for a new program is that most mothers don’t understand writing itself! Learning how to construct a descriptive paragraph or write a business letter is not the same thing as understanding the process of up-chucking words from your guts onto paper—which is what writing is and should be.
When we reduce writing to forms and formats, workbooks and formulas, we rob it of its essence—the expression of a person in written form. Instead, we settle for words that fit style and structure sheets, editing guides and exercise goals. At that point, writing becomes a game to play (trying to meet the expectations of the guidelines rather than investigating one’s inner life). Powerful writing means translating the internal thought life of a real person into written language that sounds like that person. Certainly there are skills to be learned along the way to support the communication value of that expression, but without the fundamental understanding of writing as an art, as a living, personalized, expression of each child, we risk robbing our kids of the joy and freedom that ought to be a part of every writer’s life.
By taking the time to learn about the nature of writing together with your child, you ensure yourself years of successful writing projects that will free you to leave behind the “hunt for the perfect curriculum” syndrome. What makes Brave Writer truly unique, is that we offer free online support through email correspondence, the Brave Writer blog and on the public forums for those who purchase the course and need help along the way.
The Introduction and Table of Contents to The Writer’s Jungle can be read here on the site.

So what’s in it? (A chapter by chapter description)

Most homeschoolers already have shelves of writing curricula. What they don’t have is a cheat sheet for themselves that trains them how to teach this beast called writing. Curricula can devote dozens of pages to the writing forms and how to construct narrative essays, but if a mother can’t get her child to move the pencil across the page, all that information will be useless!
This home study course follows the process I teach in the Kidswrite Basic Online Course with nine more chapters that investigate the nitty gritty of writing with kids. The Writer’s Jungle aims to develop brave writers–kids who aren’t intimidated by the blank page and brave mothers–moms who feel that they have what it takes to teach writing. The Writer’s Jungle takes mothers through a step-by-step investigation of the writing process using exercises and writing assignments. First, the chapter teaches a writing principle to the homeschooling parent and then the parent, in turn, teaches the principle to her children using games and exercises. These exercises build on each other until the student completes a satisfying writing project. Once mom and child have walked through the process together, this approach to writing will be used for any writing project they choose.
For instance, the first chapter focuses on language arts practices that create a language rich environment in your home. The processes of copywork and dictation are laid out in detail including new tactics for dictation not seen elsewhere (what we call French dictation and Reverse dictation). Additionally, The Writer’s Jungle explores literary elements that are readily found in quality literature but are often overlooked by parents whoa re not used to noticing them and pointing them out to their children.
The second chapter begins with the principles of communication. Rather than leading your child directly to the page, we begin with a white board, marker and conversation. Kids discover how important the selection of apt words are to the power of their communication in speaking, let alone in writing.
The third chapter explores the importance of keenly observing the subject or object for writing. Probing questions helps the student explore a concrete object using all five senses, yielding rich language, metaphor and insight that is not as easily discovered through those “descriptive paragraph” assignments. Students are free to directly interqact with the object, using spoken language to access their observations before jotting them down.
The fourth chapter introduces a key practice in the Brave Writer lifestyle: freewriting. This is the chapter where parents learn how to set up their children for success in developing their writing voices.
In the fifth chapter, parents are relieved to discover tools to help them help their children overcome writer’s block. It’s not enough to ask them to write or to tell them how. We must also know how to identify and remove the barriers to writing. Chapter five gives parents more than information. It offers practical tips and tools for getting to the heart of the writing anxiety that your child experiences.
Chapter six introduces a method for narrowing the scope of those overwhelming writing assignments that expect kids to “write a paragraph on the Civil War.”
Chapters seven, eight and nine take you step-by step through the revision and editing phases of writing. They help you to know how to identify specific strengths, what to do with weaknesses, and how to create realistic expectations for your child’s writing. The power of delivering the final writing to an audience is also explored.
In addition to all of this practical help which includes both supportive, entertaining writing directed to you, the homeschooling parent, there are exercises, student samples and teacher feedback included in the manual.
The second half of The Writer’s Jungle is filled with information about writer’s voice, the dreaded elementary school report, journaling, what to do with dumb writing assignments and samples of language arts and writing schedules for all ages.
Probably the most frequently cited chapter as revolutionizing how mothers think about their children’s writing education is chapter fourteen. In it, I detail the natural stages of growth in the life of a writer from pre-writing all the way to adult level competence. This continuum is not a scope and sequence of skills to be mastered, but a guide to determining the level of your child’s fluency in writing at this stage in his or her life. This information will literally transform how you direct your child’s writing life.
Comment on the second edition: In addition to all the great stuff in the original material found in The Writer’s Jungle, the second edition (which came out in 2005) contains a new preface which includes a profile of all the Brave Writer services and how they work together, previously unpublished revision tactics that will make revising a breeze, and a short teaching about the powerful literary element of surprise. I’ve also included two playful writing exercises as well for those days when fresh words won’t come.

Excellence in Writing - a History

SOURCE: http://www.excellenceinwriting.com/page/history-institute-excellence-writing
(Excerpted from a 2006 conversation between Andrew Pudewa and Rebecca Kochenderfer, Editor of homeschool.com)

Rebecca: Andrew, tell us about how you got into teaching writing?




Andrew: Well, it was kind of accidental almost. I was working for a small school in Montana. It’s one of those schools where anybody who can do something gets appointed, and without any background in elementary education or English, I got myself into teaching English and history to a 7th and 8th grade class. There was a teacher at that school who had taken this course in Canada, called the Blended Sound-Sight Program of Learning. She was encouraging all of us to go and take this course. So I did. I went to Canada, met Dr. James B. Webster, professor of African History, who had created over the years a syllabus of structure and style in composition. It was an 11-day teacher-training course, and I learned it from Dr. Webster, came back, and taught in that school in Montana another year, and then got amazing results.

The first year I didn’t have a clue what I was doing, and the second year, I felt so smart, I knew exactly what I was doing.

The next summer I went back, took that course again from Dr. Webster, the same 11-day course in Canada. I’d learned so much, I thought there was more to learn, came back and then we moved to a different city in Montana and started home schooling our children. And so I started some after –school classes for basically my kids and their friends in the town there in Bozeman, and kept teaching this writing, went back the next summer, and Webster said, “Well, if you’re going to keep coming back, we’ll put you to work. You can help teach the thing.” So I gradually learned this system from him, and was just teaching it to children, took off a couple of years, started a whole business in customer service training seminars, which I tell you, that was a horrible thing. Nobody ever wanted to hear what you had to say. It was very depressing, and then went back to teaching music, which is my primary profession, violin and Kindermusik, and this school in Montana said, “Hey, would you come over and do a little workshop on that writing program you learned when you were working for us?” And I said, “Yeah, sure. I’d love to come on over.” And I did this seminar. A couple of home school parents in the group said, “Wow! This is the greatest thing since sliced bread! I’ve never seen anything like it. You should teach this to home school families.” And so I thought, “Wow! That’s a great way to maybe do a seminar once or twice a month and make enough money to afford to be a violin teacher, too.

So I started, with Dr. Webster’s blessing, taking his program, and designing it to be taught over a period of two days instead of 11 to home school parents. And then we did some student classes, and someone came up with the idea of putting it on video and like I said, I thought that’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. It won’t work. You know, it’s a class! You have to be there. You have to look in people’s eyes and see if they’re responding. But we sold a few videos, redid the videos, got them better, redid them a third time in 2000, so they’re relatively professional. Still they’ll have that live interactive feeling.

Rebecca: Tell us the story about Dr. Webster. You said he was an African studies college professor.

Andrew: Yes.

Rebecca: And all these people were signing up for his classes.

Andrew: Yes. It’s rather humorous. He was teaching African history at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, which is kind of a, you know, ivy league type of school up there. And he had worked in Africa 16 years teaching in the British system. So when he came back to Canada, he felt that the Canadian students’ writing skills were kind of substandard. He found it difficult to teach history to students who couldn’t write well enough to do history. So he started giving little mini lectures, 10 minutes at first, the first 10 minutes of every history period on how to organize your paragraphs, organize your essays, rules to follow, stylistic checklists, and he built up a very sophisticated checklist, had over a hundred things that you would do for a paper in Webster’s class. So it was a very, very detailed rubric. Of course, the students liked that because they knew, “Okay, now we know exactly what to do for this professor.” And word got around Dalhousie that if you wanted to learn to write, you wouldn’t mess with the English Department; you’d go take an African history class.

Rebecca: And that’s the method that you then learned and that you used for your own students.

Andrew: Yes. And of course, Dr. Webster geared this down. His aunt is Mrs. Anna Ingham. She has been a primary, you know, first, second grade teacher for several decades. She designed this phonics-based reading and writing program, The Blended Sound Sight Program of Learning that Dr. Webster was helping her teach during the summer courses. This was the origin of the 11-day course that I took. And, over the years, Dr. Webster gradually started to take his university level writing ideas of structure and style, and gear them down for use in an elementary, middle school level as well.

Rebecca: Well, I’m sure glad you discovered them.

Andrew: I am, too, and it is exciting to see how you can have children with very high aptitude in writing and very undeveloped aptitude in writing, and the system works for both ends of that spectrum.