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Course format If you would like to purchase printable reading response cards to use in your classroom, you can do so at our TeachersPayTeachers Store. You can find resource presentation here –> Nonfiction Reading Responses.
In the ELA classroom, literacy skills include decoding text and then analyzing its meaning, implicit and explicit themes. It also requires an examination of the text’s relationship to a given point of view, the author’s purpose, and relevant texts and media.
This is where these tips come in.
The following analytical responses are intended to be general and generalizable and can be applied to a range of texts. Here, the most specific form is nonfiction text, including essays, articles, editorials, speeches, memoirs, biographies, and other informational texts.
How to use these tips
Each prompt is designed independently, so teachers can select one or more prompts based on the text, the skills emphasized, or the needs of individual students. Some proven methods:
As read response station: Print the cards and place them in locations around the room. After reading a shared text, such as Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” students take turns answering two to three prompts of their choice.
As differentiated journal tips: Assign specific prompts based on where students need practice. Students working on identifying authorial techniques might answer: Prompt 3 (“How do authors establish and develop themes throughout the text? What tools do they use?”), while students prepared for a more complex analysis might answer Prompt 9 (Compare texts in terms of theme, tone, writing style, and organization of ideas).
To start the discussion: Use a single prompt to structure a Socratic seminar or group discussion. Tip 5 (“Who is the audience? How do you know?”) can produce productive debate when applied to editorials or political speeches (where the target audience is not obvious).
As preparation for the assessment: Because prompts reflect the type of analytical thinking required on standardized assessments, regular use can develop familiarity with close reading and evidence-based responses without the need for separate exam preparation.
The prompt appears in the image below. If you’d like to download actual cards to use in your classroom (see image above for an example), we’ve created a lesson set You can download it here.
Content area: English Language Arts, Literature, Writing
grade level: High School/Grades 8-12
non-fiction
Self-guided reading response
15
- What seems to be the author’s purpose? Why do you think so?
- What do you have to say about the topic? Explain how it is implicit or explicit.
- How does the author establish and develop themes throughout the text? What tools do they use? Which one stands out the most and why?
- What is the author’s stance on a given topic in the text? How do you know?
- Who is the audience? How do you know? How does the choice of audience affect the text?
- What is the overall tone of the text? How did the author establish it?
- From what perspective does the author write?
- What are the most relevant supporting details the author uses to argue his position?
- Compare and contrast this article and any related texts in terms of theme, tone, writing style, and organization of ideas.
- How would you describe the author’s writing style? Explain using evidence from the text.
- How is the author’s expertise and/or credibility reflected in the text?
- What is the overall mood of the text? How did the author create it?
- How is the plot, argument, or information organized? Explain using evidence from the text.
- Identify one element of the text that can be changed, and then predict and explain the impact of that change on the meaning of the text.
- Create your own response. Be playful, interesting or creative.
TeachThought: Research-Based Teaching Strategies
