English Language Arts and Reading.3.10.C

The student is expected to

explain the author's use of print and graphic features to achieve specific purposes;

author's purpose strand teks talk image

Knowledge and Skills Statement

Author's purpose and craft: listening, speaking, reading, writing, and thinking using multiple texts. The student uses critical inquiry to analyze the authors' choices and how they influence and communicate meaning within a variety of texts. The student analyzes and applies author's craft purposefully in order to develop his or her own products and performances.

During a read aloud, point out a variety of print and graphic features. Elicit student responses to questions about the features. Add to student answers as needed.

Possible questions to ask: 

  • How does the photo/illustration/graph/timeline help the reader understand the text?
  • Why is the word ____ italicized?
  • How does it support the text and help the reader?
  • How does the information in ____ section relate to the main idea?
  • Why is the word ______ written in bold?
     

Further Explanation

This assessment example requires students to examine in detail how authors purposely use print features, such as captions and bold print, as well as graphic features, such as photographs, for a variety of reasons. As students examine these text features, they should be able to determine the effectiveness of their us and reasons they were included.

Students should examine in detail how authors purposely use print features, such as sections and bold print, as well as graphic features, such as photographs and illustrations, for a variety of reasons. For example, authors of informational texts often include bolded or italicized font to support understanding by calling attention to important words and phrases. Likewise, timelines can help a reader by presenting key dates and events in a visual format.

Research

1. Jennings, K. A., Rule, A. C., & Vander Zanden, S. M. (2014). Fifth graders' enjoyment, interest, and comprehension of graphic novels compared to heavily-illustrated and traditional novels. International Electronic Journal of Elementary Education, 6(2), 257–274. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?q=graphic+novels&ft=on&id=EJ1053749

Summary:  Researchers explore the effectiveness of graphic novels as a way to address student interests and include visual media in the curriculum. Graphic novels were identified as one way to successfully bring multimodal texts in the classroom. The study concludes that reading graphic novels increased student discussion and story comprehension. The heavily illustrated novel scored higher in the study assessment than the traditional novel.

2. Monnin, K. (2010). Teaching media literacy with graphic novels. New Horizons in Education. 58(3), 78–84 Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/q=author%27s+use+of+print+and+graphic+features+to+serve+purpose&pr=on&ft=on&id=EJ966661

Summary:  This article reviews current media literacy research and its emphasis on defining media literacy texts as texts that rely on both print literacies and image literacies. The conclusion is that novels rely on both print literacies and image literacies, so they qualify as media literacy texts and can be taught as such in K-12 classrooms.