Pre-writing materials to prepare your students for a Guided Draft

Before starting a Guided Drafts assignment, we recommend that students have done some pre-writing and have an idea of what they want to write. Feel free to use your own materials, but here are some optional pre-writing materials! You can use these documents in conjunction with each other, or choose one to prepare your students for the assignment.

To assign a Guided Draft, click here!

💡 All the pre-writing worksheets below are designed to work either as printed paper handouts or as PDF files that students can type into directly. To complete worksheets digitally, students should download PDFs to their computers before typing into them. They can then send or upload the saved PDFs to share their work with you.

Persuasive Essay Pre-Writing Materials

• Selecting a Thesis
  • Helps students weigh two opposing opinions in order to land on a thesis
• Generating a Thesis and Topic Sentences
  • Guides students through a thesis and topic sentence brainstorm
• Generating Reasons from Evidence
  • Helps students decide on topic sentences by organizing evidence into reasons that support their thesis
• Outlining
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail

Argumentative Essay Pre-Writing Materials

• Selecting a Thesis
  • Helps students weigh two opposing debatable opinions in order to land on a thesis
• Generating a Thesis and Topic Sentences
  • Guides students through a thesis and topic sentence brainstorm
• Generating Claims from Evidence
  • Helps students decide on topic sentences by organizing evidence into claims that support their thesis
• Outlining
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail
• Outlining (with Counterargument Paragraph)
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail, including a counterargument paragraph

Expository/Informational Pre-Writing Materials

Planning for All Expository/Informational Essays

• Generating Ideas, Evidence, and a Thesis in Response to a Prompt
  • Helps students annotate a prompt, then brainstorm ideas and collect evidence in order to land on a thesis
• Generating a Thesis and Topic Sentences
  • Guides students through a thesis and topic sentence brainstorm
• Generating Supporting Ideas from Evidence
  • Helps students decide on topic sentences by organizing evidence into supporting ideas that support their thesis
• Outlining
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail

Planning for Cause/Effect and Compare/Contrast Essays

• Planning for a Cause/Effect Essay
  • Helps students brainstorm causes or effects of their topic in order to narrow their focus and generate a thesis
• Planning for a Compare/Contrast Essay
  • Helps students brainstorm similarities and differences between two topics in order to generate a thesis

Narrative Essay Pre-Writing Materials

• Brainstorming Conflict
  • Helps students brainstorm a conflict for their narrative by considering character desires and challenges
• Developing Setting and Characters
  • Helps students brainstorm details about their narrative’s setting and characters (especially helpful for planning how to set the scene at the beginning of a narrative)
• Outlining Your Narrative’s Conflict
  • Supports students as they plan out their narrative’s main conflict in more detail (especially helpful for developing the action in a narrative’s middle section)
• Brainstorming Theme from Conflict
  • Helps students brainstorm a theme for their narrative by considering how the main conflict will impact the story’s characters (especially helpful for planning the end of their narrative)

 

Literary Analysis Pre-Writing Materials

• Analyzing a Text to Brainstorm Essay Ideas
  • Helps students analyze key elements of a text to brainstorm ideas that they could develop into a thesis
• Evidence Cards
  • Helps students collect evidence from a text to help them generate a thesis or to support a thesis students already have
• Generating a Thesis that Responds to a Prompt
  • Guides students through analyzing a prompt in order to land on a thesis that responds to it (especially helpful for students preparing for a standardized test with a prompt) 
• Identifying a Theme to Use in a Thesis
  • Helps students identify one of the text's themes and use that theme to land on a thesis.
• Generating Supporting Ideas from Evidence
  • Helps students decide on topic sentences by organizing evidence into supporting ideas
• Outlining
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail

Poetry Analysis Pre-Writing Materials

• Reading Closely to Arrive at an Interpretation
  • Helps students brainstorm an interpretation with scaffolded questions that move them through several readings of a poem to arrive at a deeper meaning or message
• Glossary of Terms to Describe Features of a Poem
  • Supports students in identifying and describing poetic devices with a glossary of terms and annotated examples
• Outline
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail

Rhetorical Analysis Essay Pre-Writing Materials

• Generating a Thesis
  • Helps students identify the author's purpose and rhetorical choices in order to land on a thesis
• Analyzing a Text to Develop a Thesis
  • Helps students analyze the rhetorical choices an author makes, selecting the choices that best support the author's purpose in order to develop a thesis
• Finding and Analyzing Evidence
  • Helps students collect evidence of an author's choices from a text and identify how these choices impact the audience and support the author's purpose
• Outlining
  • Supports students as they plan out their essay in more detail

Compare and Contrast (Text Analysis) Essay Pre-Writing Materials

• Brainstorming Ideas for Comparing Texts (Poems or Narrative Texts)
  • Helps students analyze key elements of two poems or narrative texts to brainstorm ideas they could develop in their essays
• Brainstorming Ideas for Comparing Texts (Argumentative or Informational Texts)
  • Helps students analyze key elements of two argumentative or informational texts to brainstorm ideas they could develop in their essays
• Generating a Thesis Using a Venn Diagram
  • Helps students brainstorm similarities and differences between two texts in order to generate a thesis 
• Generating Topic Sentences from Evidence
  • Helps students decide on topic sentences by organizing evidence into ideas that support their thesis statements
• Outlining and Collecting Evidence
  • Supports students in choosing an organization strategy and outlining their essays with evidence

ACT®Essay Pre-Writing Materials

•  Analyzing the Prompt and Coming Up With a Thesis
  • Helps students analyze the prompt’s issue and perspectives and decide on a nuanced thesis
• Time Management Strategies for the Test
  • Suggests a time management strategy that students can practice and use on test day
• Outlining
  • Supports students in planning their essay with a quick outlining approach they can replicate on test day

SAT® Essay Pre-Writing Materials

• Analyzing a Text for Persuasive Strategies
  • Helps students analyze an author’s strategies in a persuasive text (especially helpful for planning an SAT essay in an untimed practice setting)
• Time Management Strategies for the Test
  • Suggests a time management strategy that students can practice and use on test day
• Outlining
  • Supports students in planning their essay with a quick outlining approach they can replicate on test day

Learn more about Guided Drafts

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2. How do I use Guided Drafts in my classroom?