Activities

1. Define theme.
   
   
2. Identify author’s purpose.
   
   
3. Identify key characters, settings, and events in a story.
   
   
4. Identify the perspective, viewpoint, and/or attitude of the narrator or character.
   
   
5. Tell how characters react to a challenge in a story or how the speaker in a poem reflects upon a topic.
   
   
6. Identify quotations that confirm the meaning or support the analysis of a text.
   
   
7. Draw on appropriate background knowledge to construct meaning from the text.

8. Determine the theme of a story, drama, or poem.
   
   
9. Summarize the main events in a text.
   
   
10. Analyze a character’s perspective in a text through interaction with other characters.
    
    
11. Show why details in the text contribute to the stated theme.
    
    
12. Explain the effect of the narrator’s/speaker’s point of view on other elements of the text.
    
    
13. Explain inferences, conclusions, predictions, and generalizations by citing appropriate details and examples from the text.

14. Evaluate how a character’s implicit and explicit assumptions / beliefs / character traits are developed in a story using textual evidence for support.
    
    
15. Identify how/whether a character evolves/changes over the course of the text.
    
    
16. Recognize where prior background knowledge may or may not be accurate and adjust understanding of the text accordingly.
    
    
17. Make, test, and revise predictions of the text’s meaning during reading.
    
    
18. Explain how the theme emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details in the text.
    
    
19. Assess if all supporting details in the story support the proposed theme.
    
    
20. Describe the relationship between central ideas and details.

Answer Key/Rubric

1. Student provides a definition of the literary term theme.  A theme is an idea that the writer repeats throughout his/her work in multiple ways.  It is not the same as the subject of a story. A subject is a topic that is a foundation of a story.  For example, the subject may be “crime” while the theme is “crimes cannot be hidden.”   It is most often up to the reader to discover the theme of the story; it is rarely explicitly stated.
   
   
2. Student identifies the author’s purpose for writing the story. Possible purposes might include: to reveal a conflict, to draw attention to an issue or event, to predict the future, or to understand the past.
   
   
3. Student correctly identifies the key characters, settings, and events in the story.  The student can recognize that some characters, settings, and events are minor, sometimes even insignificant in a story.  Those that play a critical role need to be identified and recognized  as their place plays an integral part throughout the story.
   
   
4. Student identifies the perspective, viewpoint, and/or attitude of the narrator or character.  A narrator or character, just like a real person, has a distinct perspective, viewpoint, and/or attitude.  Recognizing and understanding what those are help to understand how events are described and developed in the story.
   
   
5. Student retells how a character reacts to a challenge in a story or how the speaker in a poem reflects on the topic of the poem.  This retelling allows the student to start to think about how the character or speaker thinks and acts throughout the writing.  The character’s or speaker’s thoughts and actions often directly point to the theme of the story or poem.
   
   
6. Student selects direct quotations from the text that point to the general meaning of the text.  These are quotations taken directly from the text and require no further analysis or interpretation to connect them to the text’s central message.
   
   
7. Student considers what he/she knows about the topic prior to reading the text and uses that information to construct meaning from the text.  Students with no prior background knowledge of a topic may, if appropriate, enlist in opportunities to build background knowledge prior to reading the text.
   
   
8. Student states the theme of the story, drama, or poem being read.  The theme stated is an idea that the writer has repeated throughout his/her story in multiple ways.  This recurring idea throughout the story, drama, or poem is seen through characters words, thoughts, actions, and dialogue.  It may be seen through characters’ interactions with one and other.  It might be seen through narration provided by the author.
   
   
9. Student is able to summarize the main events of the story, drama, or poem.  The summary mentions only important aspects of the story.  It omits insignificant details.  It is brief in scope.
   
   
10. Student analyzes a character’s perspective and how the character interacts with other characters.  Information is taken explicitly from the text as well as inferred and generalized from the text. 
    
    
11. Using the identified theme, the student shows why details found in the text support the theme.  If details don’t support the theme, the student revises the previously stated theme or considers if details have been used accurately.
    
    
12. Student analyzes the narrator’s (or character’s) point of view, and determines how it affects other elements of the text.  The way that characters, events, and setting are used in a story might be affected by the narrator’s point of view.
    
    
13. Student makes inferences, conclusions, predictions, and generalizations about the text.  Furthermore, he/she is able to cite appropriate details and examples from the text that support and explain the inferences, conclusions, predictions, and generalizations.  Those inferences, conclusions, predictions, and generalizations may be found to be valid or may need to be omitted or revised based on the evidence found in the text.
    
    
14. Student is able to find textual evidence to support a character’s explicit assumptions, beliefs, and character traits that are developed in a story.  Strong characters are built by both explicit statements and by additional evidence woven throughout a text.  The student is able to identify both and connect them.
    
    
15. Student identifies if and how a character changes throughout the story.  Conclusions are drawn as to why the character changes or doesn’t change during the course of events.  If the character changes or evolves throughout the story, reasons why and results of that change are stated.
    
    
16. Using evidence found in the text, student recognizes where his/her prior background knowledge is accurate or inaccurate and adjusts the understanding of the text appropriately.  At times, further research beyond the story may be needed to more fully understand if or how the prior knowledge and the text are valid.
    
    
17. Throughout the reading process, the student is consistently making, checking, and revising predictions of the text’s meaning.  As the student explains the text explicitly, draws inferences and/or generalizes the text, he/she tests the new information against what was previously thought and revises the suggested meanings.
    
    
18. Student explains how the stated theme was evident throughout the story.  Student considers such questions as: When was the theme first evident?  How did it recur?  What specific details or events placed throughout the text supported the theme?
    
    
19. Student assesses if the supporting details found throughout the story contribute to the suggested theme.  The theme should be evident throughout the story; as a result, details should also be evident consistently throughout the story.
    
    
20. Student finds central ideas and details and describes the relationship between and among them and the theme.  Details should provide backing and evidence for the central ideas.  Central ideas should demonstrate the theme.