Figurative language is one of the most explicitly rewarded elements in NAPLAN, ICAS, selective, and scholarship writing assessments. The official NAPLAN rubric specifies that top-band writing should demonstrate five to ten deliberate figurative techniques and markers count them. Get below the threshold, and the writing reads as plain. Get above the threshold without control, and the writing reads as trying too hard. The skill that distinguishes top-band students isn’t using more figurative language it’s using exactly the right amount, deployed exactly where it matters.
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: most students misunderstand figurative language entirely. They sprinkle similes and metaphors decoratively throughout their writing, hoping more is better. They reach for clichés (as cold as ice, as fast as lightning, brave as a lion) that actively cost marks in top-band assessments. They miss the techniques that examiners genuinely reward original imagery, sustained metaphors, sensory precision and over-rely on the techniques that signal inexperience.
At Clever Fox Education, our team has spent years marking student writing against the official NAPLAN rubric, including direct work writing and reviewing assessments at UNSW Global. We can tell, within the first paragraph, whether a student has deliberate control over their figurative language or whether they’re decorating their writing in the hope that markers will be impressed. This guide walks through every dimension of figurative language that lifts writing into the top band: counting techniques, choosing the right ones, avoiding cliché, sustaining metaphor, integrating language naturally, deploying it at high-impact moments, and editing for purpose. Each section includes the insider tip most students never hear, high-scoring examples, and practical exercises you can try today.
If your child can master these eight elements, their figurative language won’t just meet the criteria it will demonstrate the kind of deliberate craft that earns top-band marks.
1. Know the Target — Five to Ten Techniques, Used Deliberately
💡 Insider Tip: The NAPLAN rubric specifies five to ten figurative techniques for top-band writing. Markers count them. Fewer than five, and the writing reads as plain. More than ten in a short piece, and the writing reads as overwrought. The goal is deliberate, controlled deployment not maximum quantity.
The eight types of figurative language that count:
Simile — comparing two things using like or as “Her voice was like rustling tissue paper.”
Metaphor — saying one thing is another “Her voice was a brittle thread.”
Personification — giving non-human things human qualities “The wind clawed at my jacket.”
Hyperbole — deliberate exaggeration for effect “I’d been waiting a thousand years for this moment.”
Onomatopoeia — words that imitate sounds “The branches snapped, crunched, and groaned beneath his feet.”
Alliteration — repeated consonant sounds at the beginning of words “The wind whispered through the wild wheat.”
Idiom — figurative expressions with a fixed meaning “My heart sank like a stone.” (note: also a simile counts as one technique)
Symbolism — using objects, colours, or images to represent larger ideas “The cracked photograph sat alone on the mantelpiece a quiet reminder of everything she had lost.”
✅ Pro Tip: Aim for six to eight techniques in a typical narrative or persuasive piece. That’s enough to comfortably exceed the floor without crowding the writing. Spread them across the piece, not clustered in one paragraph.
Exercise: Take a recent piece of your writing. Count the figurative techniques. If you’re below five, identify three places to add one deliberately. If you’re above ten, identify three places to cut one. Notice how the writing feels more balanced after the adjustment.
2. Choose Variety, Not Repetition
💡 Insider Tip: Markers reward variety of figurative techniques, not repetition. A piece with eight similes is technically meeting the quantitative target but signals to markers that the student has one tool and uses it eight times. A piece with three similes, two metaphors, one personification, and one example of alliteration signals deliberate craft and tonal range.
Ordinary (only similes): “Her hair was like silk. Her eyes were like emeralds. Her smile was like sunshine. Her voice was like music.”
(Four techniques, all the same type no variety.)
High-Scoring (varied techniques): “Her hair was like silk, falling in waves around her face. Emeralds couldn’t have been more vivid than her eyes. When she smiled, the room itself seemed to brighten. Her voice carried a melody that lingered long after she stopped speaking.”
(Four techniques: simile, metaphor, personification, metaphor the same content, varied delivery.)
✅ Pro Tip: When you’ve used a simile, vary the next technique. Try a metaphor, a personification, an alliterative phrase. The variety itself signals control and confidence.
Exercise: Take a paragraph with multiple similes. Rewrite it so the same content is expressed using four different types of figurative language. Notice how much more sophisticated the writing reads.
3. Avoid Clichés — They Actively Cost Marks
💡 Insider Tip: Clichés are the single biggest figurative language trap in student writing. Phrases like “as cold as ice”, “as brave as a lion”, “as fast as lightning”, “heart of gold”, and “like a fish out of water” have been used so often that they’ve lost their meaning. Markers don’t reward clichés they penalise them. The reasoning: clichés signal that the writer has reached for the first available comparison rather than thinking of their own.
Ordinary (clichés): “She was as brave as a lion. Her heart was as cold as ice. She ran as fast as lightning.”
High-Scoring (original): “She faced down the empty hallway the way her grandmother used to face down winter head up, jaw set, refusing to flinch. Whatever warmth she’d once felt for him had hardened into something glass-edged. She ran the way an animal runs from fire not toward anything, just away.”
✅ Pro Tip: The cliché test: Have you heard this comparison before? If yes, replace it. Original similes and metaphors don’t need to be elaborate they need to be yours. Even a small, fresh observation (“as merry as a bee in clover”, “like a heat pack in a cold night”) demonstrates more craft than the most polished cliché.
Exercise: Take a piece of writing. Identify every figurative comparison. For each one, ask: Have I heard this before? Replace every cliché with an original alternative. Notice the immediate lift in craft.
4. Use Sensory Precision
💡 Insider Tip: The strongest figurative language is sensory it activates the reader’s senses (sight, sound, smell, touch, taste) rather than just describing an abstract feeling. Markers consistently reward writers who show emotion or atmosphere through sensory imagery rather than telling the reader what to feel.
Ordinary (abstract): “She was sad and lonely.”
High-Scoring (sensory imagery): “The silence in the house pressed against her ears like cotton wool. Her tea had gone cold; she hadn’t noticed. Outside, a single magpie called once and stopped.”
(Three sensory images touch/pressure, taste/temperature, sound convey loneliness without ever using the word.)
✅ Pro Tip: When you want to convey emotion or atmosphere, ask: What would the reader see, hear, smell, touch, or taste in this moment? Choose two or three sensory details and let them carry the emotion. Direct emotional statements (“She was sad”) are far weaker than sensory implication.
Exercise: Take a moment of strong emotion from your writing. Identify how the emotion is currently conveyed. Rewrite it using two or three sensory details instead of an abstract statement. Notice how much more powerful the moment becomes.
5. Sustain a Metaphor Across a Scene
💡 Insider Tip: The technique that most clearly signals top-band figurative craft is the sustained metaphor a single metaphorical idea developed across two or more sentences. Students who can sustain a metaphor demonstrate that they’re thinking metaphorically, not just decorating with isolated similes.
Ordinary (isolated metaphor): “She was a storm of emotions. She felt angry and confused.”
(Single metaphor, immediately abandoned.)
High-Scoring (sustained metaphor): “She was a storm gathering on the horizon. The first low rumble of anger had been growing for days, and now the clouds had darkened to bruise-purple. By the time she walked into her mother’s office, lightning was already flickering behind her eyes.”
(The storm metaphor is developed across three sentences, with the imagery deepening as the metaphor progresses.)
✅ Pro Tip: Try to sustain one major metaphor across each piece you write. Use it at the opening, return to it in the middle, and let it land at the close. A well-sustained metaphor is one of the most memorable elements of a top-band script.
Exercise: Take a piece of writing. Identify one moment with a strong metaphor. Extend the metaphor across the next two sentences, developing the imagery further. Notice how much more cohesive and crafted the passage feels.
6. Integrate Figurative Language Naturally
💡 Insider Tip: Top-band figurative language flows naturally in the sentence. Mid-band figurative language feels bolted on clearly a deliberate insertion, often after a comma break, signalling that the writer was trying to include a technique rather than expressing something through it. The fix is integration: weaving the figurative language into the grammatical fabric of the sentence.
Ordinary (bolted on): “The room was dark, like a cave. The wind was loud, like a lion’s roar.”
(The similes feel inserted, not integrated.)
High-Scoring (integrated): “The room had the close, mineral darkness of a cave air heavy with the smell of old stone. Outside, the wind roared with the kind of throaty fury that made even brave dogs go still.”
(The figurative language is built into the structure of the sentence, not added to the end.)
✅ Pro Tip: If your figurative language requires a comma + like construction to land (“It was dark, like…”), consider rewriting to integrate it more naturally. The best similes and metaphors often don’t use the word like at all they emerge through embedded comparison or direct metaphor.
Exercise: Take three figurative phrases from your writing. For each one, rewrite to integrate the figurative language into the structure of the sentence rather than appending it at the end. Notice how much more natural the writing reads.
7. Save Figurative Language for High-Impact Moments
💡 Insider Tip: The strongest writing doesn’t spread figurative language evenly across the piece it concentrates it at moments that matter most. The opening, the climax, key character revelations, and the closing image are the high-impact moments where figurative language earns its place. Routine narration between these moments can stay plain and gain power by contrast.
Ordinary (figurative language everywhere): Every sentence carries a simile, metaphor, or personification. The reader can’t tell which moments matter most because everything is dressed up.
High-Scoring (deliberate concentration): The opening lands a strong image. The middle stays plainer to let the plot move. The climax delivers the most powerful figurative moment in the piece. The closing image echoes or transforms the opening.
✅ Pro Tip: When planning a piece, identify the three or four highest-impact moments opening, climax, key character reveal, close. Reserve your strongest figurative language for those moments. Let the connecting passages be cleaner, which gives the high-impact moments more weight by contrast.
Exercise: Take a piece of writing. Identify every figurative technique you used. Mark which moments in the piece they appear in. If the strongest techniques aren’t at the highest-impact moments, redistribute them. Move your best simile or metaphor to the climax. Save your most powerful image for the close.
8. Edit Figurative Language for Purpose
💡 Insider Tip: The final editing layer for figurative language is the purpose test. For every simile, metaphor, personification, or image in your writing, ask: What does this contribute? If a figurative element doesn’t serve emotion, advance imagery, or reveal character, it’s decoration and decoration costs marks.
The three legitimate purposes of figurative language:
To create emotion make the reader feel what the character feels To deepen imagery make abstract concepts concrete or sensory To reveal character show how the character or narrator sees the world
Ordinary (decorative): “The sky was as blue as a swimming pool. The grass was as green as a lime. The clouds were as white as marshmallows.”
(Three similes none of which advance emotion, imagery beyond the obvious, or character. Pure decoration.)
High-Scoring (purposeful): “The sky was the same brittle blue it had been the morning her father left. She hadn’t looked at a sky like that in fifteen years and meant it. Now, walking back along the same beach, the colour pressed against her chest like an old bruise.”
(Two figurative techniques the metaphor and the simile both serve emotion and reveal character. The colour isn’t decoration; it’s memory.)
✅ Pro Tip: During editing, highlight every piece of figurative language. For each one, identify which of the three purposes it serves. If it doesn’t serve any of them, cut it or rewrite it. Top-band figurative language is always doing a job.
Exercise: Take a piece of writing. Highlight every figurative technique. For each one, label its purpose: emotion, imagery, or character. Identify any that fail the test. Cut or rewrite them. Notice how much sharper and more purposeful the writing becomes.
The Bottom Line
Top-band figurative language combines meeting the five-to-ten technique target, choosing variety over repetition, avoiding clichés, prioritising sensory precision, sustaining a major metaphor across the piece, integrating language naturally, concentrating it at high-impact moments, and editing every element for purpose. Every choice signals one thing to markers: deliberate, controlled craft.
At Clever Fox Education, we teach figurative language explicitly not as decoration, but as one of the most powerful tools a writer has to control emotion, atmosphere, and character. Most students arrive thinking more is better and clichés are safe. Within weeks of explicit teaching, they leave thinking deliberate is better and original is essential.
The good news is that figurative language is one of the most learnable writing skills there is. It doesn’t depend on natural literary flair or wide reading alone. It depends on clear techniques, deliberate practice, and detailed feedback exactly the model that has earned Clever Fox students over $6 million in scholarship offers and 90% success rates across NAPLAN, ICAS, selective, and scholarship exams since 2015.
Your child’s next piece of writing can be the one where every simile, every metaphor, every image earns its place. The craft starts here.