Middle School
Literature Study
What’s in a Genre Anyway?
I thought there was only
fiction and non-fiction?
Genres of Literature
Fiction Genres
Non-Fiction Genres
*Historical Fiction
*Science Fiction
*Romance
*Mystery
*Fantasy
*Poetry
*Auto-biography
*Biography
*Textbook
*Encyclopedia
*Research Articles
*Histories
But, why does this matter to me?
1) More advanced high school classes and college classes will require
the knowledge of different genres.
2) Each genre is written differently. Familiarity with all of them is
essential to good reading comprehension.
3) Knowledge from several different genres will make full
comprehension of text possible.
4) NC Dept. of Instruction mandates that all middle school
students be able to, “Compare and contrast the structure of two
or more texts and analyze how the differing structure of each text
contributes to its meaning and style.”(Common Core Standard 5)
WHAT’S WITH FICTION?
(VOCABULARY)
Historical Fiction - fiction that encompasses characters, events, or places from the
distant past. Historical fiction usually has a true to life, where are they now
denouement.
Science Fiction - fiction based on imaginary scientific, technological, or societal
advances which usually contains a positive.
Romance – fiction that is centered around the love relationship of the main character
usually containing positive denouement..
Mystery - fiction that contains a detective (whether professional or amateur) who
solves one or more crimes. These stories contain denouement that give the who, what,
where, and how to the crimes and are usually positive.
Fantasy – fiction that contains magical, supernatural, or impossible elements in the
story’s primary plot.
Poetry - a class or category of artistic endeavor having a particular form, content,
technique, or the like with two levels of meaning, one stated and one unstated.
STORIES WE READ FROM EACH GENRE:
• Fiction
• Historical Fiction –Edith Cavell by Herman Hagedorn
• Science Fiction-excerpt from “Journey to the
Center of the Earth” by Jules Verne
• Romance-Eros and Psyche as told by
• Mystery-Hit and Run by John MacDonald
• Fantasy-A Grain as Big as A Hen’s Egg by Leo
• Poetry-The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere by Henry
Wadesworth Longfellow
STORIES WE READ FROM EACH GENRE:
Non-Fiction
• Auto-biography- “The Most Important Day” by Helen
Keller
• Biography- “The Attack” and “Castaways” excerpts from
Survive the Savage Seas by Dougal Robertson
• Textbook- History of the World in a Christian Perspective
by A Beka Books
• Encyclopedia- World Book Encyclopedia
• Articles- “What It’s Like When You Can’t Read” Us News
and World Report
• Histories- The Bible