multiple genres TEKS talk image

Knowledge and Skills Statement

Multiple genres: listening, speaking, reading, writing, and thinking using multiple texts--genres. The student recognizes and analyzes genre-specific characteristics, structures, and purposes within and across increasingly complex traditional, contemporary, classical, and diverse texts.

Present students with an argumentative text. Lead a class discussion about the intended audience or reader. A teacher may wish to use the questions below to guide the discussion.

Questions to Consider:

  • Who was the author writing to?
  • What information in the text tells you who the audience is?
  • Why do you think the author is writing to that audience?

 

Further Explanation

This item requires students to identify the specific target group for a message. Students should also consider who would be interested in the topic being presented and be aware that the intended audience could be a single person, a group of people, or the general public.

a text written to demonstrate to an audience that a certain position or idea is valid and that others are not The writer appeals to reason, develops, defends, or debates the topic, connecting a series of statements in an orderly way so they lead to a logical conclusion.
Students should identify the specific target group for a message. To do so, students must first determine the author’s purpose. Authors have various motivations when they decide to write. They may want to inform readers about something, explain something to the reader, persuade them to do something, or simply entertain them. The author may also intend to do any number of these things within the same text. It is important that students think about who would be interested in the topic being presented and be aware that the intended audience could be a single person, a group of people, or the general public.
Students are expected to have a clear idea of the particular attributes of argumentative texts. For example, students should know that argumentative texts have unique characteristics such as a claim, an intended audience, and the use of facts in support or refutation of an argument. Students should also recognize structures, such the introduction, claim, facts, arguments, counterarguments, and conclusion, of argumentative text that impact how an argumentative essay is organized. Each one of these structures has a specific function in an argumentative text that students should identify and explain.