Teaching Text Structures

Denise Burson
Jul 28, 2008

During the past few years, teachers at all grade levels have become increasingly interested in developing student understanding of text structures in expository readings. Mounting pressures for improved student standardized test performance have resulted in increased attention to exposition. Because 70-80% of standardized reading test content is expository (Daniels, 2002), it is essential to provide students with the tools necessary to develop understanding of this type of text. Researchers have identified five basic organizational structures of expository text: sequence, description, cause and effect, problem and solution, and compare and contrast. The Learning-Focused Literacy Model can help you with the tools and strategies necessary to explicitly teach the following:

Sequence or time order uses time, numerical, or spatial order as the organizing structure. The author traces the sequence or the steps in the process.

Description or listing provides information, such as facts, characteristics, and attributes about a subject, event, person, or concepts. This organization is the most common pattern found in textbooks (Niles, 1965; Bartlett, 1978). Descriptive reports may be arranged according to categories of related attributes, moving from general categories of features to specific attributes.
 
Cause and Effect structure is used to show causal relationships between events. Cause and effect attempts to explain why something happens; how facts or events lead to other facts or events (effects). A single cause often has several effects. Also, a single event may have several causes.

Problem and Solution requires writers to state a problem and come up with a solution. Problem/solution structures are typically found in informational writing. However, realistic fiction often uses a problem/solution structure so that children can learn to identify the problem and present one or more solutions to that problem.

Comparison and Contrast points out the likenesses and/or differences between two or more subjects. This structure is used to explain how two or more objects, events, or positions in an argument are similar or different. Graphic organizers such as Venn diagrams, compare/contrast organizers, and data matrices can be used to compare features across different categories.

To learn more about the Learning-Focused Literacy Model solutions click here.