Elaboration Reference Sheet

Many students don't know where to begin when asked to add commentary to cited text evidence. This reference sheet comes to the rescue, listing six types of elaboration or explanation: Fact, Example, Definition, Reason, Importance, and Process. It defines and gives an exemplar of each type. It also includes “look fors” for each type -- signal words, phrases or traits that will help students analyze samples and incorporate them into their own work.

These commentary techniques are the same ones featured in my free writing tutorial on crafting body paragraph. If you like this free resource, you may be interested in my elaboration practice activity that challenges students to classify 20 examples of commentary into one of these six categories. Thanks for looking.. and enjoy!