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Writing Prompts for Analyzing Nonfiction
Below, we provide a number of writing prompts that teachers can use to help students analyze nonfiction texts in remote classrooms. Although these writing prompts were written with a few common nonfiction genres in mind, they can be easily adapted to work for other nonfiction genres (or even, with a little more work, fiction genres).
General Analysis Prompts for Nonfiction Writing
- Purpose
- What is the purpose of the text?
- What kind of text is this? Is this appropriate for the writer’s purpose?
- Organization
- What structure does the text broadly follow?
- How is the text laid out/organized?
- Is the overall structural organization appropriate to the text type?
- In your opinion, are any sections that might improve the text missing?
- Connectives/Transitions
- Does the "flow" or progression of ideas in this text seem smooth and logical?
- Can you identify any clear instances of transitional or connective elements in the text?
- Is there an appropriate variety of these transtitional/connective elements?
- Language
- What other interesting or unusual language features do you see in the text?
- In your opinion, does the text demonstrate a varied vocabulary, or is it too dry and repetitive?
- What is your overall impression of the text? Why?
Narrative Nonfiction Writing
- What is the story about? What is the main topic of the text?
- Who is the main character? Who are the other important characters in the story?
- Where does this story take place? How does the place influence the storyline or sequence of events?
- Are there any conflicts/problems in the story?
- How does the conflict progress? Do things get worse or better?
- How does the conflict get resolved?
- What are the most emotionally-charged parts of the story?
- How would you have reacted differently if you were the main character?
- Do you remember any similar series of events you experienced?
- What was the most memorable part of your own experience?
Informational Reports
- What is the main topic of this report?
- Is the overall purpose of the report clear? What would the author like us to do with this information?
- How does the author start and end this report?
- How efficiently did this report convey information to the reader?
- What makes this report interesting/uninteresting?
- What might the author have done differently to convey information more clearly/interestingly?
- What were you surprised to learn about the topic?
- What other topics would this type of informational report be good for describing?
- What makes this type of writing different from narrative writing?
Argumentative Writing
- What is the author's main argument?
- What would the author like us to do, if anything?
- How effective was the argument, from your point of view?
- Do you have any prior beliefs or opinions that might affect how persuasive you perceived the argument to be? What about other readers who are likely to read this piece?
- What would be some other good topics for this type of argumentative writing?
- What were the primary sources to support the author’s argument?
- What makes this type of writing different from an informational report or a narrative?
The table below provides a summary of the features common to a few important nonfiction genres. You may want to consult it as you draft your own writing prompts.
Nonfiction Genre |
Narrative |
Information Report |
Argument |
Example topic |
Account of a class field trip |
Description of local ecosystem |
Should personal travel be banned during a pandemic? |
Purpose |
To provide personal perceptions or observations of some event the author experienced |
To provide vital information about some topic or content area |
To persuade others; to put forward a position on an important or controversial topic and support it |
Organization |
|
|
|
Examples of transtitional/connective elements |
Related to passage of time (e.g., one day, once upon a time, later, next, afterward, in the end, etc.) |
Subheadings structure information |
|
Other language features |
|
|
|
Reference
Gibbons, P. & Cummins, J., (2002). Scaffolding language, scaffolding learning: Teaching second language learners in the mainstream classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
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