One of the hardest reading skills for students has been to identify and use text structures. Due to this, I decided to create a way of scaffolding instruction for text structures during this quarter.

Generally I would teach text structure as I came across it in a text, but after reading their short stories from the first quarter, I realized that they lacked description and structure.

To start off my scaffolding instruction, I decided to start with description. We discussed their lack of description in their own writing, and I used texts that provided good examples, along with peer examples that were written well. As a class, we practiced together before I had them write their own. I tried to keep it short and simple.

I did this through each text structure. Sometimes I would have to prod them with questions that would create the next text structure that we would be studying so that by the end, they would have multiple writing samples that contained more than one text structure.

Much of the idea for this unit plan came from Seravallo’s Writing Strategies. The students were hesitant at first with so much writing; however, as we are nearing the end of our writing portion, they are beginning to feel more comfortable.

The key component to all of this has been teaching them the keywords and transition words that allow a reader to easily identify the text structure. With each text structure, part of the building block to put the scaffold into place was to provide them with a word list. While I gave them a few, we generated a list together as a class. This provided my students with a growing vocabulary of words to use in their writing.

Revisiting Text as a Part of Scaffolding Instruction

Another part of my teaching strategy has been to constantly go back to texts we have read and identify other structures within the one that we read. For example, problem and solution can be easily tied to cause and effect with description embedded within the text. Compare and contrast can be seen where an author is discussing several solutions to a problem. When we revisit the text, we strengthen our scaffold and show students that the connections we’ve made are relevant to one another.

My goal for my students at the end of this unit will be to have them read a text and identify the text structure while providing the reason why an author chose to use that text structure. They will also take one of their written pieces to revise and edit before submitting it as a major grade.

What about Struggling Students?

I did have several students who did not understand the concept I was teaching at the time. After each written piece, I pulled students aside and met with them individually. During my writer’s conference with them, I made sure to provide them with a positive, but then retaught the concept that I wanted them to grasp before moving on with our learning. In order to make sure that I could conference with students quickly and effectively, students wrote a paragraph using the text structure prior to their essay. This provided me with the evidence I needed prior to moving forward with teaching.

Overall the scaffolding instruction has been successful at teaching students text structure. My strugglers who have often required differentiated instruction have been successful, but still require their necessary accommodations and modifications per their education plans. I’ve been happy with the results, and I’m now eagerly anticipating our argumentative essay writing with their newly learned writing skills.

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