Robert Munsch Dialogue Mini-Lesson

Robert Munsch uses dialogue in his fictional narratives to create strong characters, to create a repeating pattern, and to add humor to his stories. Let’s learn how to use dialogue in our stories by looking closely at how Robert Munsch uses dialogue in his stories.

Stephanie’s Ponytail First, let’s take a look at the first page of Stephanie’s Ponytail.

Stephanie’s Ponytail Who are the characters talking? What do you notice about the punctuation in the dialogue Robert Munsch uses on the first page of this story? Let’s go back and look and use the promethean board to highlight and write down what we notice.

What We Learned About Dialogue From Robert Munsch 1.) Identify the character who is speaking. Stephanie said, “It’s my ponytail and I like it.”

What We Learned About Dialogue From Robert Munsch 2.) Place quotation marks “….” around the words that actually come out of the character/person’s mouth. Example, One day Stephanie went to her mom and said, “None of the kids in my class have a ponytail. I want a nice ponytail coming right out the back.”

What We Learned About Dialogue From Robert Munsch 3.) Place ending periods and commas inside the end quotation mark. When Stephanie went to school, the other kids looked at her and said, “Ugly, ugly, very ugly.”

What We Learned About Dialogue From Robert Munsch 4.) Place proper punctuation at the end of the sentence. “Stephanie said, “It’s my ponytail and I like it.”

What We Learned About Dialogue From Robert Munsch 5.) Each time a person speaks, begin a new paragraph or skip a line. When Stephanie went to school, the other kids looked at her and said, “Ugly, ugly, very ugly.” Stephanie said, “It’s my ponytail and I like it.”

What We Learned About Dialogue From Robert Munsch 6.) Capitalize the first word of what the person says, even if it occurs in the middle of a sentence. “No it’s not,” said Stephanie. “I want one coming out the side, just above my ear.” “Very strange,” said mom. “Are you sure that is what you want?”

Let’s Try It Out In your writer’s toolbox, take a look at your story map. Look at your problem section and consider the dialogue that will take place between your characters. For practice, try writing down dialogue between two characters using quotation marks. We will come and check and see how you are doing.