Descriptosaurus Books

There are now 11 books in the Descriptosaurus series find out how they support teachers at KS1 and KS2.

Descriptosaurus books help children expand their descriptive vocabulary, experiment with language and sentence structure and build up narratives based around settings, characters and creatures, so they can improve their creative writing.

Written for teachers to support all children in the classroom, including reluctant writers and those faced with blank page syndrome, they can also be used at home by parents. Published by Routledge, the books can be bought on routledge.com and there's also a video and free guides below from the authors to help you learn more.

Which Descriptosaurus book do I need?

There are now eleven books in the Descriptosaurus series, and if you haven't used them before it might not be obvious how they are different and which books are right for you, your school or your children.

If you are new to Descriptosaurus, there are two books that are an ideal entry point.

Descriptosaurus: Supporting Creative Writing for Ages 8–14, by Alison Wilcox

Descriptosaurus Story Writing: Language in Action for Ages 5–9

Both books are a comprehensive resource and provide the essential building blocks to create a narrative text, alongside contextualized banks of vocabulary, phrases and model sentences. Hardback and A4 they have both been praised as an excellent classroom book.

Descriptosaurus Story Writing Video

Co-author Adam Bushnell shows how the the book can be used to help children create a narrative about a creature.

Descriptosaurus Personal Writing

Descriptosaurus Genre Books

Building on the vocabulary and descriptive phrases introduced in the original bestselling Descriptosaurus these are all for children aged 8 -14.

Descriptosaurus Punctuation Books

More recently published are four books that provide punctuation instruction - using the principles of Descriptosaurus and creative writing.

Punctuation is a difficult subject to engage children (or adults!) with, so the idea here is to use the character and the fun of the story to draw kids in and then show how changing punctuation or incorrect punctuation can alter the story and what actually happens to the characters. Each book is written for different ages and so the series provides complete coverage of KS1 and KS2.