5th grade reading · Informational Text · RI.5.8

Author's purpose

What is this skill?

An author writes with a goal: to inform, to persuade or to entertain. Fifth graders learn to tell which goal is the main one, to find the clues that show it, and to see how an author's choices of facts, tone and structure serve it. Many texts mix purposes, so they also learn to decide which one wins. A factual article that ends with a call to act is mostly trying to persuade.

The five longer passages are "Why Every School Needs a Garden," "How to Build a Simple Bird Feeder," "The Day My Robot Vacuum Declared War," "The Hidden Cost of Fast Fashion" and "Where the Giant Sequoias Grow," from about 210 to 245 words. Questions ask the main purpose, a sentence that is a clue to persuasion, why the author lists materials before steps, how a funny line shows the author is not being serious, why the author says "None of this means you should never buy a new shirt," and how a sequoia text differs from an essay called "Save Our Sequoias Now." Short reads ask whether an octopus fact paragraph, a plea about the town library or a story about dentures in a punch bowl is meant to inform, persuade or entertain. Others spot the clue in a recess argument, call a paper airplane text an explanation, and read a book blurb that persuades. Yes-or-no questions check that step-by-step directions inform and that a text can have more than one purpose. Sorting tasks place texts by purpose, and facts used as evidence apart from opinions an author pushes.

Why it matters

Everything a child reads or watches was made by someone for a reason, and advertising, product pages and videos are often built to persuade. A fifth grader who stops to ask what a writer wants from them is better protected, and better informed, than one who takes every page at face value.

The skill helps with their own writing. Knowing that an essay persuades and an explanation informs gives them a plan for what to put in and what to leave out.

Common mistakes

  • Assuming a text with facts only informs. A persuasive piece uses facts as evidence. Ask, "What does the author want me to do or think after reading?"
  • Missing humor. A funny narrator and exaggeration signal that the goal is to entertain, even when the topic is a household chore.
  • Mixing up "persuade" with "inform" because both give reasons. Persuading takes a side and asks for agreement or action.
  • Forgetting that one text can serve two purposes. The best answer names the main one and can explain why.

How to help at home

  • When you see a commercial or a product page with your child, ask, "What do they want us to do?" and "Which parts are facts and which are opinions?"
  • Sort the mail or a stack of magazines into inform, persuade and entertain. A catalog and a comic make good contrasts.
  • Ask your child to write two short paragraphs about the same subject, one to inform and one to persuade, and compare the word choices.
  • Look at the first and last sentences of an article and ask what each is for.

Worked examples

These are real questions from the Tutorsaurus author's purpose practice, with the answers worked out.

  1. Example 1

    What is the purpose of the last paragraph?

    How to Build a Simple Bird Feeder A bird feeder brings nature right to your window, and you can build one in about twenty minutes with things you already have at home. You will need: a clean, empty plastic bottle with its cap, two wooden spoons, a piece of string about two feet long, scissors, and birdseed. Step 1: Ask an adult to help you cut two small holes near the bottom of the bottle, directly across from each other. Make each hole just big enough to push a spoon handle through. Step 2: Slide one wooden spoon through both holes so the handle sticks out one side and the bowl of the spoon sticks out the other. The bowl becomes a perch and a tiny tray for seeds. Step 3: About three inches higher, cut two more holes and add the second spoon, turned so it points the opposite way. Step 4: Above each spoon bowl, cut a small hole the size of a pea. Seeds will trickle out onto the spoon as birds eat. Step 5: Fill the bottle with birdseed, screw on the cap, and tie the string around the neck. Hang your feeder from a branch where you can see it from a window. Within a day or two, you should have visitors. Keep a notebook nearby and write down which kinds of birds you see.

    Choices: To tell readers what to do once the feeder is built, To warn about dangers, To explain how to cut the bottle, To describe the spoons

    Answer: To tell readers what to do once the feeder is built. It tells where to hang the feeder and suggests keeping a bird notebook.

  2. Example 2

    What is the author's purpose in this book blurb?

    You will laugh. You will gasp. You will stay up past your bedtime. The Secret of Thornwood Manor is the mystery everyone will be talking about this summer. Get your copy today!

    Choices: To explain how to write a mystery, To persuade readers to buy the book, To tell the whole story, To inform readers about manors

    Answer: To persuade readers to buy the book. The exciting language and "Get your copy today!" are meant to sell the book.

  3. Example 3

    This text gives facts AND asks for action. Which is the MAIN purpose?

    Monarch butterflies that spend the winter in Mexico now cover more than 80 percent less forest than they did in the 1990s. One big reason is the loss of milkweed, the only plant their caterpillars eat. You can help. Plant milkweed in your yard this spring, and ask your school to plant some too.

    Choices: To inform, because it has facts, To describe milkweed, To entertain, because butterflies are pretty, To persuade, because the facts build toward asking readers to act

    Answer: To persuade, because the facts build toward asking readers to act. The facts are there to convince you to plant milkweed. The main goal is persuasion.

Try a 5-question mini-quest

Question 1 of 5

Free, no sign-up. Hand the screen to your child or play it together. Nothing is saved.

What does the author use to support the claim that gardens improve health?

Why Every School Needs a Garden Imagine a classroom with no walls, where the lesson changes with the seasons and the homework is a handful of fresh tomatoes. That is what a school garden offers. Every school should have one. First, gardens teach science in a way no textbook can. Students who plant seeds watch germination happen. They measure growth, test soil, and observe insects doing real work. A child who has grown a bean plant understands photosynthesis far better than one who has only read about it. Second, gardens improve health. I believe kids are more willing to eat vegetables they grew themselves. A student who turns up her nose at salad in the cafeteria may gladly taste a pepper she picked herself. Third, gardens build responsibility. Plants do not wait for a convenient time. They need water on hot days and protection on cold ones. Students learn that living things depend on them. Some say gardens cost too much or take too much time. But a garden can start with a few buckets of soil and seeds that cost less than a pizza. Parent volunteers and local nurseries are often happy to help. The benefits are too great to ignore. School leaders should put a garden in every schoolyard, and they should do it this spring.

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