Text Types Overview

Overview

Students begin Unit 1 by identifying how common text types are structured for different purposes. They explore narrative, persuasive and informative texts, noticing that some texts combine features (hybrids), and they practise explaining how structure supports meaning.

Learning intentions

• Students will recognise that different text types have different structures because they serve different purposes.
• Students will identify typical language and structural features of narrative, persuasive and informative texts.
• Students will explain, using sentence starters, how specific structural choices help a text achieve its purpose.

Success criteria

• I can sort short excerpts into narrative, persuasive or informative (and justify with a feature or structure).
• I can name the purpose of each text type and describe its typical structure.
• I can point to one structural feature (e.g. topic sentence, claim, complication, or sequence) and explain how it helps the reader.

Curriculum links

• English — Language: Students explain how texts are structured depending on their purpose and how language features vary, recognising that some texts are hybrids that combine different genres or elements of different genres.
• English — Literacy: Students analyse how authors organise ideas to develop and shape meaning (including cause/effect, compare/contrast, and proposition-support patterns).
• English — Literacy: Students plan and create texts by selecting appropriate structures and language features for an intended purpose (previewing this unit’s writing tasks).
• English — Language: Students understand paragraph cohesion using examples, quotations and substantiation of claims (preparing for later lessons on stronger paragraphs).

Lesson structure (30 minutes)

1. 0–4 min · Hook (What is the text trying to do?). Teacher shows three cards or slides with the same topic (e.g. school playground rules) labelled only “Read me”. Students quick-match: “Which one wants to tell, persuade or entertain?” and state a reason (one word).

2. 4–10 min · Mini-lesson: Purpose → structure → language. Teacher explains that texts are built to achieve a purpose; then introduces three common structures:

• Narrative: orientation → events/complication → resolution
• Persuasive: claim → reasons/arguments → evidence/examples → restatement/call to action
• Informative: introduction (topic) → key points with explanation → conclusion/summary Students annotate a simple teacher-provided graphic organiser with arrows from purpose to structure.

3. 10–17 min · Guided sorting (Three short extracts). Teacher provides three short excerpts (10–12 lines each) at Year 8 reading level. Students in pairs/independently (based on ability; with 1 student, teacher uses guided questioning) answer:

• Which text type is this?
• What makes you think that? (choose one evidence: a clue sentence, a sequencing marker, a persuasive phrase, or a narrative event marker) Teacher checks by asking the student to read one sentence and explain what it “does” for the reader.

4. 17–24 min · Language spotlight: clue words and sentence patterns. Teacher highlights that language features often signal structure:

• Narrative: “then/after that/at first/soon”, past tense verbs, feelings or description of events
• Persuasive: “should”, “because”, “for example”, “therefore”, “we should”
• Informative: “this means”, “for instance”, “the main reason is”, definition phrases Students underline one clue word/phrase in each excerpt and write one sentence beginning:
• “This structure helps because …” Teacher uses one example sentence and co-constructs the response.

5. 24–29 min · Consolidation: Build a hybrid awareness. Teacher explains briefly that some texts combine purposes, e.g. an informative article that includes persuasive recommendations, or a narrative with a persuasive message. Students receive a fourth very short passage (hybrid, 6–8 lines) and decide which two text types’ features they can see, listing two features only (no full justification required).

6. 29–30 min · Exit ticket (check for understanding). Students complete a one-question exit ticket:

• “Choose one text type (narrative/persuasive/informative). Write its purpose and name one structural feature.”

Resources

• Three short excerpts (narrative/persuasive/informative) on printed paper or board screenshots
• One graphic organiser: Purpose → Structure → Language clues (three columns)
• Highlighters or pens for underlining clue words/phrases
• Fourth short hybrid excerpt (brief and age-appropriate)
• Exit ticket slips or a single digital form (if available)
• Timer visible to student

Assessment

• Formative during sorting: teacher listens for the student’s justifications linked to evidence in the text.
• Formative during language spotlight: teacher checks the student’s “This structure helps because …” sentence for clarity and link to purpose.
• Exit ticket: quick check that the student can state purpose and one structural feature correctly.

Differentiation

• Support: provide sentence starters for justification (“I think it’s persuasive because…”, “A structural clue is…”, “It helps the reader by…”).
• Support: allow the student to choose the evidence sentence from a pre-selected list (teacher-provided options) to reduce reading load.
• Extension: ask the student to rank two structural features by importance for the purpose (“Which part matters most and why?”) if time allows.
• EAL/SEN: pre-teach a small set of clue words (e.g. “because”, “then”, “for example”) and permit oral responses that the teacher records before writing.

Lesson focus for teacher (quick reminder)

Keep the emphasis on structure linked to purpose, not on producing a full paragraph yet. This lesson sets the foundation for later lessons where students will plan and write in selected text types and hybrids.