Writing Feature Articles - Step 1 - Lesson 1 | Page 23

Writing Feature Articles - Lesson .
Beginner

Mini Lesson (

min)

Show lesson visuals, Test Your Topic.
Modify Mentor Text:
Use “Teens Take on the School
Cafeteria. The Result – A Healthier
Student Body!” from the Feature
Articles Packet – Beginner (Handout
1.1a) to provide an example of an
author’s purpose.
Modify Instructional Strategy:
Have students use Test Your Topic
– Beginner (Handout 1.4a) as a way
to scaffold their thinking.

Experienced
Modify Mentor Text:
Use “Gothic Teenagers – Misguided
or Misunderstood” from the Feature
Articles Packet – Experienced
(Handout 1.1a) to provide an
example of an author’s purpose.
Modify Instructional Strategy:
Explain that students should
think about their angles in light
of what they want their readers
to understand about their topic.
For example, they might want
readers to know about both sides
of an issue (pro and con), or what
happened over the course of time
(chronological), or the cause and
effect of a particular phenomenon.
Have students consider more
than one possible purpose of
their articles as they think ahead
to researching their topics. By
considering at least two possible
purposes, they are less likely to
conduct their research in too narrow
a fashion, thus rejecting information
that is critical to

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Today’s Strategy: To narrow down topics and angles by testing
them with a set of guiding questions.
Tell students that in this lesson they will test their topics
and angles to determine whether or not they are good
subjects for their feature articles. Explain that when
journalists get ready to write their articles, they meet with
their editors to determine whether their topics are suf?ciently
engaging to readers and easily investigated within the time
frame they have.
Review the key characteristics of an effective feature
article:
• Feature articles have a focused topic.
•

Feature articles go in-depth.

•

Feature articles provide a new perspective, often taking
a human interest angle and/or including a personal story.

Introduce the idea that writers have a purpose in mind
when they write their articl es, and the purpose will be
re?ected in the speci?c information the writer provides his
or her audience. A writer might want readers to understand, for
example:
?? both sides of an issue (with an article such as “Home
Recycling, Is It More Trouble Than It’s Worth?”);
?? multiple perspectives on a place, phenomenon or event
(with an article such as “The New Yankee Stadium – Not
Rich? Not Welcome”); or
?? a problem and its solution (with an article such as “Can’t
Make it in Kindergarten? – Wait Another Year”).
Use an appropriate mentor text from the Feature Articles
Packet – Intermediate (Handout 1.1a) to show how
an author communicates his or her purpose by using
particular content. Read aloud the ?rst section of “Family
Translators,” an article which exempli?es a pro vs. con
argument. Point out the section headings, explaining that
the author aligned the article’s structure and content with his
purpose – to show two sides of the life of children of parents
who do not speak English. The purpose of the article in?uenced
the writer’s research, the article’s structure and its content.
Students will return to this concept in Step 3 as they decide on
an organizational structure for their writing.

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