CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.11-12.2e

ELAGrades 11–12Text Types and Purposes

The Standard

Establish and maintain a formal style and objective tone while attending to the norms and conventions of the discipline in which they are writing.

Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students write with precise, formal language and keep personal bias out of explanations. They adjust structure, terms, evidence, and citations to match the subject they are writing in.
What Mastery Looks Like: Students choose precise words, avoid slang and loaded language, and support claims without personal reactions. They keep that tone consistent and follow the expected structure, terminology, and citation practices for the subject.
Common Misconceptions: Students may think formal writing requires long sentences and inflated vocabulary. They may confuse objective tone with having no claim, or treat every discipline as if it uses the same format and evidence.
How to Assess It: Exit ticket: Rewrite this sentence for a lab report: “We totally proved our awesome fertilizer made plants grow way better.” Then name two changes that made the tone formal and objective.

Lesson moves

Sort sentence strips into formal and informal piles, then revise three informal examples for a lab report, history essay, or literary analysis.
Compare how a scientist, historian, and literary critic would describe the same event, then write one sentence in each discipline’s style.
Run a tone repair relay where teams replace slang, first-person opinions, vague claims, and loaded words with precise, neutral language.
Edit a mock city council report so its wording, evidence labels, and headings fit a professional public document.

Learning progression

If students are struggling here, check these first.

Keep exploring

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