4 Essential Keys to a Text Feature Lesson
Planning a text feature lesson is my favorite part of a nonfiction reading unit. There are so many fun possibilities and exciting activities that you can do with your students. However, it is really easy to do an entire unit without diving deep into the core content of why text features are important. In this blog post I am going to share with you the 4 keys that I have found to an effective text feature lesson and a FREEBIE too!!
1. Don’t teach one text feature…
and then not talk about it again. While I do explain that I teach them one at at time in my free tips and ideas guide, it is important to not do a one and done approach. Make sure you are circling back every few text features and looking at a page to identify multiple text features and how they work together.
Read about the first 4 text features I always teach to get started!
I also try to work in text features with any nonfiction unit we do after initially learning them. Just ask students to identify the title, caption, heading, bold text, use the glossary etc. Continuing to use the vocabulary and name each feature will keep the information fresh in the students’ minds as they are learning other skills.
2. When leading a text feature lesson…
Make sure that you don’t only ask closed questions.
By closed questions I mean:
- What is the title?
- Where is the heading?
- What is the photograph?
- Where is the caption?
- What page is chapter 1 in the table of contents?
These are also valuable and essential for practicing the identifying part of text features but then you need to move into interpreting. It is important to dive into the meaning and purpose behind the design/ look of a text feature. This is what helps students understand how it functions in the text and how they are related to each other.
Open ended text feature questions help students
- talk about text
- think outside of the box
- gain a deeper understanding of each text feature
- better understand the overall text
- appreciate nonfiction text more
I have a FREEBIE to help you do this with your students!
3. Challenge students to
think about the deeper meaning of the text features! I like to do a text feature lesson where I have my students put their “author hats” on and think about if they were writing this text.
I challenge them to think why the author:
- chose that title
- chose that picture
- wanted to tell that information
- made that the focus of the information
- mentioned that word many times
- used a caption to tell us that information
They also get the opportunity to rewrite an article and change the text features to what they think would improve how the information was delivered.
4. Make sure to not only use high level texts
The perfect text feature lesson begins with a mentor text as an interactive read aloud and ends with independent practice.
I love to incorporate text feature activities in my reading centers all year!
My favorite activity to do is my Color By Comprehension passages. Students read a one page nonfiction passage, answer comprehension questions (5 text feature questions, 3 text comprehension), and then color a half sheet according to the multiple choice answers. It is such a fun and engaging activity to do after a text feature lesson for students to practice applying what they learned.
I also love using short accessible books like National Geographic Look and Learn for easy comprehension and intentional focus on text features.
I hope that these ideas and tips help you in planning text feature lessons for your students.
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