Standard 3: Critical Reading and Writing

Students will apply critical thinking skills to reading and writing.

4.3.R.6 Students will describe the structure of a text (e.g., description, compare/contrast, sequential, problem/solution, cause/effect).

Student Actions 

Teacher Actions 

• Students will identify the characteristics and purposes of different types of text structures (e.g., description, compare/contrast, sequential, problem/solution, cause/effect).
• Students will locate topic sentences, signal words, and context clues that help identify the text structure.
• Students will explain the structure of a text.

• Teachers review and explain how to identify different types of text structures.
• Teachers provide opportunities for students to identify the characteristics and purposes of different types of text structures.
• Teachers model how to locate topic sentences, signal words, and context clues that help identify the text structure. 
• Teachers provide opportunities for students to locate topic sentences, signal words, and context clues that help identify the text structure.
• Teachers provide guidance as students identify and explain the structure of a text using topic sentences, signal words, and context clues to support their thinking.

Supporting Resources

Teacher Insights

20 Research Based Strategies for Teaching Text Structures (PDF)   

Poster of Text Structure Signal Words (PDF)

• At this level, students move from describing text structure with guidance and support to independently describing the structure of a text.

• Text structure refers to the way an author organizes their text.

• Identifying the text structure at the beginning encourages the reader to question how subsequent sections of the text fit into the identified text structure. This process enables the reader to monitor their comprehension.

• Proficient readers of literature will not necessarily be  proficient readers of expository texts. Fiction texts follow similar general organizational patterns; however, expository texts can have very different text structures.

• To describe structure in a text, students need the academic vocabulary:

• Description: text structure that presents a topic, along with information that describes that topic.

• Each section opens with its main idea, then elaborates on it, sometimes dividing the elaboration into subsections.

• Signal Words: For example, for instance, specifically, in particular, in addition

• Compare and Contrast: text structure in which ideas are related to one another on the basis of similarities and differences.

• Signal Words: However, unlike, like, by contrast, yet, in comparison, although, whereas, similar to, different from

• Sequential Order: text structure in which ideas are grouped on the basis of order or time.

• Signal Words: Next, first, last, second, another, then, additionally, finally

• Problem and Solution: text structure in which the main ideas are organized into two parts: a problem and a solution to the problem, or a question and an answer that responds to the question.

• Signal Words: problem, solution, resolution

• Cause and Effect:text structure that notes a relationship in which an event (the cause) make(s) another event happen (effect).

• Cause: Why? Effect: What Happened?

• Signal Words: Consequently, therefore, as a result, thereby, leads to

Due to recursive nature of the standards, it is essential that teachers are aware of how all objectives within and between strands work together for optimal instruction.