How to Do Literary Analysis

When I became an English teacher, I don’t think I realized how much of my time would be spent on teaching how to “do” literary analysis. For me, it was something I just did–not necessarily because I was super talented, but because I wasn’t afraid to read something, have an idea about it, and then share that idea. By the time students reach high school, the gap between the students who read–ideate–write and those who don’t has widened significantly. How’s a teacher to stretch herself across that gap?

Literature Analysis Definition

At its core, I teach students how to do literary analysis by writing a literary analysis paragraph. If they can build that, they can build an essay. The literature analysis definition I teach is really that it’s an argument. There are four main parts.

The Claim

This can be in response to a question (this often helps spark students’ thinking, working like a research question that guides inquiry). Even if it isn’t in response to a question, it is a statement about the text that requires reasoning and evidence to prove its validity. If you can say it without any evidence or reasoning, it is not a very strong claim (if it is a claim at all).

The Evidence

This is a direct quote or paraphrase from the text that supports the claim. Necessity applies here as it does with the claim. If the evidence can be stated and understood without any reasoning/explanation to connect it back to the claim, it’s not super compelling evidence.

The Reasoning

This can be part of the same sentence as the evidence or after it, but it ties the evidence back to the claim. It connects the dots for readers. The cycle of evidence and reasoning is repeated usually for several sentences because a claim needing only one piece of evidence and reasoning also isn’t very compelling.

The Fermata

This is the last sentence of the paragraph. The fermata is a term that comes from music, but I first heard it applied to writing in a book called The Magic Words by Cheryl Klein. This is a book about writing YA by a YA editor, which I applied to my own novel writing, but I also have used it to teach fiction, as well as fermatas in any writing. Klein describes it as holding an idea that readers can consider–an idea that grounds them in the message but also gives them food for thought. It’s not leaving things ambiguous to trick the reader, but allowing them a moment to dwell with their own thinking in the world built by the writer (which could be the world of the argument they are making). This metaphor has worked again and again with my students.

Literary Analysis Purpose

If you don’t have the time to launch into a full non-literary analysis unit, you can also recreate that idea in one lesson. Students can share about a topic of choice and their analyses of said topic without doing any formal writing. You can draw their attention to how they use claims, evidence, and reasoning to explain their analyses.

A debate about a passionate topic can be another way to introduce claim, evidence, and reasoning, and why they matter. If you want to do a low-stakes debate form, check out resources from Dave Stuart, Jr.

Analytical Paragraph Writing Tips for Every Student

Because this is a mainstay of language arts classes, there is plenty of time to teach, reteach, and extend students’ understanding and execution of the writing. Here are my top tips:

Be prepared to make your own analytical paragraph writing example.

This is important because you are able to explain the process from the inside. You will also be a model of how to deal with the more difficult parts of the process. If you come with a premade example, students may believe there must be something wrong with them if they struggle. If you come with no example, the students may feel too overwhelmed to manage all the parts.

Starting with poetry can really help this process. It allows you to model analytical paragraph writing with a short text. I had students copy my example in their notes (they could type or handwrite–example is provided for those that need it). This hand-over-hand support lets them feel and see the sentence structure.

Give them analytical paragraph words to use.

As you may know, I am obsessed with domain language, and analytical writing has its own set of words to use. I start the year with a very repetitive set of language. The students who need it hold onto it, and the students who already have it use their own language. Their work can become exemplars. When students are ready to write with more sentence variety, you can pull similar language from the texts of advanced students.

This also becomes a fabulous time to teach between- and within-paragraph transitions. I am especially a fan of within-paragraph transitions (because it easily transfers to longer essays) and students get less exposure to considering the relationship between their ideas. They include three pieces of evidence because we said three, disregarding how said pieces work together (or potentially contradict each other).

Analysis Writing Techniques to Teach

There are so many analysis writing techniques to unpack for student. I recommend targeting them one by one, based on what you see students needing to practice.

First Pre-Skills to Teach

Though dependent on grade level, these techniques are primarily pre-skills. In the Common Core, students begin practicing analysis in the second grade, so these pre-skills prepare secondary students to do a secondary version of the standards with more complex texts.

1. Analyzing a prompt.
2. Analyzing a specific pieces of evidence.
3. The language to use for writing with evidence and reasoning.
4. Organizing pieces of evidence and their reasoning.
5. Writing with stamina (students being able to take said information and turn it into writing in 20 minutes or less).

Standard Analysis Writing Techniques to Teach

Again, it may depend on grade level, but here are some general considerations I make with 9th and 10th graders in mind.

1. Writing a claim inductively (gathering the evidence and generating a claim from it).
2. Introducing quotes grammatically.
3. Gathering strong and thorough evidence.

Advanced Analysis Writing Techniques to Teach

1. Setting your own analytical purpose.
2. Writing a deductive claim that needs evidence.
3. Managing quotes vs. paraphrasing vs. using one- or two-word quotes.
4. Adding a fermata to wrap up their paragraphs.

Start With This How To Do Literary Analysis Guide

If you are looking for a resource, check out this bestseller from my shop. I have used this resource repeatedly in 9^th and 11^th grades for students who need a refresher on the basics of analytical paragraphs. They start developing these skills in elementary school, so having this guide frees me up to focus the whole class on what’s fresh at their grade level when it comes to analytical writing. This hacks guide lives as a quick-reference on my class page for students, but can also serve as a basis for mini-lessons when students need differentiated instruction during writing workshop. Enjoy!