Close Reading of Short Texts/ Writing the Literary Essay
Part I: Immersion
Day 1: Good readers pay attention to details and make judgments about the characters
(I gave every student a copy of “First Baseball Glove” by Donald Graves – from the book
Baseball, Snakes, and Summer Squash, and I wrote the poem on chart paper. We read it
aloud twice and then went back and stanza by stanza looked for clues about the
personalities of the characters. We wrote down the judgments and questions about
characters we came up with along the side. Students also wrote on their copy.
Day 2: Good readers visualize the setting.
(We will go back to the same poem and , stanza by stanza, write down what we can infer
about the setting. I will then give them a copy of another poem by the same poet and have
them, independently, write on the sides what they can infer about the characters and
setting).
Day 3: When the short text has a story, good readers identify the conflict and resolution.
(We will revisit the same poem and identify the conflict and resolution. Then we will fill
out a narrative elements graphic organizer that has a space for characters, setting,
conflict, and resolution. I will then have students do the same independently with another
poem, “The Bully,” from the same book).
Day 4 and Day 5: What is the author’s point?
(We will talk about both the author’s main point as well as other points the author may be
making. The idea is to encourage students to come up with something that is not
completely obvious.
Here are some examples for “First Baseball Glove” that we might hope to elicit:
-The author shows that sometimes there is not a clear line between needs and wants.
-The author shows that growing up can be hard when it means understanding what the
grownups know.
-The author shows that getting what you want is not always enough to make you happy.
We will then go on to read other poems and short stories and figure out the authors’
points. Some will be done as a whole group, others independently. I will have students
share out excellent examples to celebrate these.
Part II: Writing the Essay
Day 6: Look at example of a literary essay.
We will read Visitng Day. I will give students the opportunity to come up with ideas for
what the author’s points might be. Then we will do a shared reading of an exemplar
literary essay on this book (written by a student from last year).
I will elicit form the students what the elements of a literary essay are.
Then I will discuss how this student completed this essay. I will distribute a literary essay
planning page, and we will fill it out together as the students who wrote the exemplar
essay would have.
Then students will give the opportunity to choose one short text to write a planning page
for.
Day 7: Write planning pages for multiple short texts, and choose one to write literary
essay on.
Day 8: Draft Literary essay (I will draft the introduction and body paragraph 1 of my own
during the mini-lesson. They will do the same during independent work.)
Day 9: Draft Literary Essay (continue)
Day 10: Finish Drafting.
Day 11: (Revise – add evidence, add your own evaluation)
Day 12: edit
Day 13: Publish