4.10.E
The Standard
identify and understand the use of literary devices, including first- or third-person point of view
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for English Language Arts and Reading
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students determine who tells a story by noticing pronouns and what the narrator knows. They explain whether the narrator is a character or an outside voice.
What Mastery Looks Like
- Students correctly name the viewpoint of a passage and support the choice with pronouns and narrator clues. They explain how the viewpoint shapes what readers learn about events and characters.
Common Misconceptions
- Students may label any story with “I” in dialogue as first person, even when a third-person narrator tells it. They may also confuse the author with the narrator or assume third person means the narrator knows every character’s thoughts.
How to Assess It
- Give students two short passages. Ask them to label each viewpoint, underline pronoun clues, and name one detail the narrator can or cannot know.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Give pairs passage cards, highlighters, and sorting labels so they mark narrator clues and sort each card into first or third person.
Read a short scene and ask, “What can the narrator tell us, and what remains unknown?” Students cite two details.
Play Point of View Detective by displaying passages while teams identify the viewpoint and earn a point only after explaining their evidence.
Compare a diary entry with a newspaper report about the same event, then list how each narrator changes the details readers receive.
Keep exploring
Related Standards
- 5.10.E
The 5th Grade version of this standard.
- 8.9.E
identify and analyze the use of literary devices, including multiple points of view and irony;
- 6.9.E
identify the use of literary devices, including omniscient and limited point of view, to achieve a specific purpose;
- 3.10.E
identify the use of literary devices, including first- or third-person point of view;
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