How to Use scrawl in a Sentence

scrawl

verb
  • She scrawled her signature on the receipt.
  • Dozens of names had been scrawled by people in heavy black ink.
    Compiled By Democrat-Gazette Staff From Wire Reports, Arkansas Online, 27 Aug. 2023
  • Her eyes linger on the sandwich board out front, with words scrawled in chalk.
    Carly Tagen-Dye, People.com, 17 July 2025
  • On a huge wall of tiles, many black faces are scrawled in a troubling grid.
    Vinson Cunningham, New Yorker, 30 May 2025
  • Hope scrawls a single word on the paper and folds it up.
    Carly Tagen-Dye, People.com, 21 Aug. 2025
  • The first blurry image shows a line scrawled on her chest.
    Scott MacFarlane, CBS News, 18 Dec. 2025
  • There were drawings scrawled on the wall, a desk spattered in paint.
    Emily Witt, The New Yorker, 9 Oct. 2023
  • Roughly a half-dozen baseballs, each with a date and score scrawled across it.
    BostonGlobe.com, 25 Dec. 2019
  • For those with notes scrawled on both sides, be sure to find an album with clear pockets.
    Cameron Beall, Southern Living, 23 Mar. 2025
  • Tyler receives a scary message scrawled on his photos in the lab.
    refinery29.com, 18 May 2018
  • Has any recipient of that email not seen worse words scrawled on a wall?
    Leah Garchik, SFChronicle.com, 11 June 2019
  • Someone had scrawled the words marry me on the rusty derrick.
    Heather Richardson, Travel + Leisure, 11 Oct. 2025
  • The crushed garter snake is scrawled on the tarmac in an ampersand.
    Rosanna Warren, The Atlantic, 7 Sep. 2025
  • Michals would often scrawl the work’s title on the image.
    Maximilíano Durón, ARTnews.com, 11 June 2026
  • On the wrist straps are Street’s initials, scrawled in marker.
    Los Angeles Times, 11 Feb. 2026
  • Filthy walls were scrawled with names, pleas and snatches of poetry.
    Declan Walsh Ivor Prickett, New York Times, 5 June 2024
  • Wojick still has the numbers scrawled on his whiteboard.
    Ira Gorawara, New York Times, 5 Mar. 2026
  • The menu, scrawled on a blackboard by the bar, gastropub-style, wasn’t a long one.
    Marina O’Loughlin, Bon Appetit, 23 Oct. 2017
  • In girls’ schools, the courage to scrawl a slogan on the blackboard is spreading to younger groups.
    Krista Stevens, Longreads, 1 Nov. 2022
  • The school also had a threat scrawled on a bathroom stall on Wednesday.
    Cliff Pinckard, cleveland.com, 23 Feb. 2018
  • There’s a message scrawled on the balloon in marker that can now be clearly seen.
    Andy Schatschneider, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 5 Feb. 2018
  • One of them was scrawled in orange lettering across a mirror.
    Hannah Dailey, Billboard, 1 Oct. 2025
  • On Monday, the word was scrawled on the poster bearing Louk’s face.
    Kevin Sieff, Washington Post, 31 Oct. 2023
  • When cutout hearts in windows and chin-up messages scrawled in chalk still were enough to cheer us up and keep fear at bay.
    Los Angeles Times, 4 Apr. 2020
  • The nicknames are scrawled on a whiteboard in the trailer office.
    Sammy Roth, Los Angeles Times, 16 Apr. 2024
  • In the city of Daraa, some teenage boys scrawled anti-regime graffiti.
    Jay Nordlinger, National Review, 27 Jan. 2025
  • Teenagers have scrawled the message in their notebooks and carved it into at least one pumpkin.
    BostonGlobe.com, 31 Oct. 2019
  • The boy drew up his own plays, scrawling one in the dirt during his first season playing the game.
    Houston Mitchell, Los Angeles Times, 15 Aug. 2023
  • Calderon invited the man to take a seat near the specials of the day scrawled in chalk on a blackboard.
    Vincent T. Davis, ExpressNews.com, 7 Oct. 2019
  • In a black-box gallery, white graffiti and drawings are scrawled across every plane of the room.
    Hilarie M. Sheets, New York Times, 26 May 2017

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'scrawl.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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