CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.9-10.2e

ELAGrades 9–10Text 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 use precise, neutral language and avoid slang, emotional claims, and casual phrasing. They follow the vocabulary, structure, citation, and formatting practices expected in the subject.
What Mastery Looks Like: A student writes clear claims supported by evidence rather than personal feelings. Word choice, sentence structure, citations, and formatting fit the subject and stay consistent throughout the piece.
Common Misconceptions: Students may think formal writing requires long words, passive voice, or complicated sentences. They may treat objective tone as having no claim at all. Some assume first person is always wrong, even when the discipline allows it.
How to Assess It: Give students a casual, opinion-heavy paragraph about a science or history topic. Ask them to rewrite three sentences using neutral language and subject-specific conventions.

Lesson moves

Have pairs sort sentence strips into formal, informal, objective, and subjective groups, then revise two sentences that do not fit academic writing.
Ask students to explain how a lab report should sound different from a personal blog post, using two sample sentences as evidence.
Play Tone Detective by having teams identify slang, exaggeration, vague wording, and unsupported opinion in short paragraphs, then earn points for revisions.
Compare a news report, lab report, and historical analysis about one event, then list the language and formatting choices each field expects.

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A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.9-10.2e, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.

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