Teaching Text Structure to Improve Reading Comprehension
“Students who understand the idea of text structure and how to analyze it are likely to learn more than students who lack this understanding (RAND Reading Study Group, 2002). The research literature in this field reveals that students’ reading comprehension skills improve when they acquire knowledge of texts’ structural development and use them properly.” - CORE Teaching Reading Sourcebook
Teaching text structure is important, so how do we teach it? The bones of teaching students how to identify key features of different texts remain the same across K-5. The biggest difference is in the method for reading the text. In K-2, we teach text structure orally with our read-alouds, and in 3-5 we teach it with text that students can read along with us. Before we dive in, I like to remind myself (and you!) that we aren’t teaching text structure so that our students can be experts at identifying text structure. We are teaching it to provide our students with a tool that will allow them to access and understand a text in a deeper and more fulfilling way, and thus, we are working on reading comprehension. Text structure is a powerful tool for improving reading comprehension because it helps students organize ideas and concepts from a text and synthesize the information they are learning.
In this blog post, we will discuss both narrative and informational text structure. There is a place and purpose for teaching both.
Narrative Text Structure
Before students even enter kindergarten, most will have a basic understanding of narrative text structure. When we build upon this in our classrooms, we teach our students how to summarize stories, which lends to listening comprehension, and eventually reading comprehension.
“Explicit instruction on story structure enhances students’ memory and recall of narratives, with even greater benefits for struggling readers (National Reading Panel 2020).
An easy way to teach students narrative text structure is through the use of story maps. Story maps are graphic organizers that give students a visual representation of a story. They tend to include a section for setting, characters, problem, sequences of events, outcome, and theme.
Story Map Graphic Organizer
To teach narrative text structure, use a narrative story map to help your students capture the elements of a story. Here are the steps:
Model. As you read aloud, demonstrate to students how you determine the setting by pointing out illustrations, words, phrases, or sentences that give you clues about where and when the story takes place. (Prior to reading, plan out your stopping points with sticky notes. Write down target sentences, phrases or illustrations that clue the reader in about the story elements.) Repeat this step with each story map element as you read the text.
With a new text the next day, repeat the same procedure, but this time ask questions that prompt students to pull out the characters, setting, problem, sequence, outcome, and/or theme. Have students work in pairs, and as you read, pause to ask questions that facilitate responses about the story elements. Students can turn and talk to each other to determine answers. For example:
“Turn and talk to your partner. What happened on this page? What sentence on this page gives you a clue about the problem in the story?” Students can talk to each other about the answer or record the information they learn in their story map, or both!
How you organize your lesson depends on which grade you teach. The basic structure of the lesson remains the same:
Model your own thinking during a read aloud
Practice with students (you can display a story map on a projector and work through it with your students). You might have your students recording information through writing or you may choose to have students turn and talk as you record the information.
Have students practice independently as you read a text aloud, or, have students read their own passage/text and complete the story map independently.
Students can use their story map to summarize the story orally or in writing.
Teaching Informational Text Structure
Because informational texts tend to have more challenging vocabulary and concepts, helping students unpack different text features will help them access texts in a deeper way.
Informational texts are intentionally organized to help the reader pull out key information and build connections across ideas in the text.
There are five informational text structures, and teaching them in this order is wise, because many authors incorporate multiple text structures within one text, and typically in this order:
Description: The author describes a concept or idea.
Sequence of Events: The author uses chronological order to list events.
Compare/Contrast: The author compares and/or contrasts two concepts, people, or events.
Cause/Effect: The author presents an idea and describes its effects.
Problem/Solution: The author poses a problem or question and then gives the solution or answer.
To teach informational text structure, much like narrative text structure, providing students with visual representations in the form of graphic organizers gives students an opportunity to:
Record information about specific text structures.
Learn how concepts and ideas fit within text structures.
Pull the most important information and ideas from the text.
Explore relationships among concepts in the text.
Recall important information from the text.
Write concise and organized summaries.
(Armbruster et al. 2001; Trabasso and Bouchard, 2002).
First, choose a text to read aloud to your students. The text should be connected to your content area or overarching theme or unit from a knowledge-based ELA curriculum (check out CORE knowledge if you don’t have one).
Then, organize your lesson through three components:
Before reading
During reading
After reading
Before reading
Before reading the text aloud to students, say:
“Today we are going to begin learning about different text structures. Text structures are different patterns authors use to write about an idea. There are five text structures for informational texts (briefly introduce the five structures). We can look for clues in the text to help us figure out what the text structure is. Usually, an author will use more than one of these text structures. Today we are going to read a text together and explore the different text structures. Today’s text is called _________________. It is about ____________________ (give a brief description about the text). As we read, look (or listen) for clues about what text structure the author is using. I will model first (I do), and then we’ll look at a few paragraphs together (we do).
During Reading
As you read the text to students or with students, show examples of paragraphs that correspond to each text structure. Point out key words and phrases that indicate the presence of a particular text structure.
In addition to modeling and examining signal words and phrases together, you can use graphic organizers to capture a specific text structure for students. To do so, all students should have a copy of the graphic organizer. I like to display mine through my document camera. As we read the text we fill in the graphic organizer together. I model my thinking and understanding of the text, and give students many opportunities to talk with a partner and explore a paragraph on their own.
Fiction & Non-Fiction Graphic Organizers
After Reading
The independent portion of the lesson can happen on the following day, where students are given a passage to highlight text structures on their own. If you teach K-2, this might be done with a read aloud. If students are reading their own texts, you can have them use different colored markers for different text structures to underline words and phrases in the text that indicate their respective text structures. For example, use red to underline key words for “description”. Use yellow to underline key words for “sequence”.
Final Thoughts and Tips
When you’re teaching text structure, keep the end goal in mind: to help students understand the text better. How can you make it easier for them to understand? We aren’t trying to get them to master signal words and phrases, rather, we want to build their awareness of theses phrases so that they can understand the author’s purpose and synthesize the text into their own understanding. Remember to prompt students to pay attention to headings and subheadings and to ask themselves questions such as, how are the ideas in this text connected? What is the author trying to communicate? Teaching text structure isn’t the only way to improve reading comprehension, but it is one powerful tool we can use to help students of any age understand a text better. I’d love to know how you teach text structure in the comments!
