Analyzing mentor text is an important part of our journey as writers. Before beginning their own artifact writing task, we study and analyze mentor texts to notice what "good writers" do.
We start by practicing this skill as a class, by answering guiding questions such as:
What makes this a powerful text?
What did the author do to engage you as a reader?
What parts resonated with you most? Why?
Then we move into questions about:
IDEAS-Are they completely clear? Does anything need to be clarified?
ORGANIZATION-Are they in logical order? Is there a clear topic sentence and closing sentence?
WORD CHOICE-Are a variety of words and sentence starters being used? Is there evidence of strong and purposeful word choice?
Next, the kiddos analyze a new mentor text in small, randomized groups, as shown in the pictures above. They are then in charge of sharing the analysis with the class. We start each ELA class by sharing one mentor text analysis before we start writing.
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