Analyzing the Text (Teacher Guide)
What is the purpose behind this skill? Enables a reader to focus on specific details within a text and use
those details to support a position about the text’s overall meaning.
Support every claim you make with evidence from the text!
In other words, this practice helps you build an argument and cite your evidence.
In the margins of the text take note of the following:
Before reading a passage, what should a reader do?
Think about what is already known about the topic - jot it down.
Take time to discover more about the author’s life and values - record what you’ve learned.
While reading a passage, what should a reader notice?
Record Repetitions
Observe Patterns
Note passive or active voice.
Pay attention to sentence structure!
Can you detect the author’s mood? (state of mind)
Can you detect the author’s tone? (general attitude of a place, piece of writing, situation, person,
or thing)
What punctuation was used?
Be mindful of figurative language used. (Personification, Metaphor, Simile, Alliteration, Allusion,
Imagery, Oxymoron, Onomatopoeia, Sarcasm, etc.)
Consider the author’s word choice.
Mark words that express strong emotions toward something.
Mark synonyms and antonyms
After reading a passage, what should a reader do?
Organize your margin notes.
Formulate an argument for the meaning of the text.
Once you’ve written a solid argument, write down the clues from the text that supports your
theory in complete sentences. Consider this an exercise in citing your evidence.
Reflect on what exactly made the text enjoyable or good.
In contrast, what made the text not enjoyable or good?
Analyzing the Text
Purpose:
Enables a reader to focus on specific __________
within a text & use those details to support a
__________ about the text’s overall
__________.
Before reading
While reading
After reading
Think about what you
already __________
about the topic - jot it
down.
Take time to discover
more about the
__________ &
__________ record what you’ve
learned.
Record __________
Observe _________
Note __________
voice.
Pay attention to
sentence ________!
Can you detect the
author’s _________?
__________ your
margin notes.
Formulate an
__________ for the
meaning of the text.
Once you’ve written a
solid argument, write
down the __________
from the text that
supports your theory
in complete
sentences. Consider
this an exercise in
_________ your
__________.
Reflect on what
exactly made the text
__________ or good.
In contrast, what made
the text __________
enjoyable or good?
Definition:
Can you detect the
author’s _________?
Definition:
What __________
was used?
Be mindful of
__________ used.
Types:
Consider the author’s
__________.
Mark words that
express strong
__________ toward
something.
Mark __________ &
__________
The Panther
His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world.
As he paces in cramped circles, over and over,
the movement of his powerful soft strides
is like a ritual dance around a center
in which a mighty will stands paralyzed.
Only at times, the curtain of the pupils
lifts, quietly - . An image enters in,
rushes down through the tensed, arrested muscles,
plunges into the heart and is gone.
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Nothing Gold Can Stay
Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
by Robert Frost